Chronicle Editor
Thandeka Moyo-Ndlovu, [email protected]
THE number of under-fives accessing the polio vaccine in Bulawayo has gone up during the fourth round despite concerns that some children have not yet received the life-saving immune boosting medication.
Bulawayo participated in the national Oral Polio Vaccine Campaign Round 4 which was conducted from 10 to 13 October last year.
This followed the first, second and third round campaigns which were conducted on 27-30 October 2022, 1-4 December 2022 and the 23-26 May 2023 respectively.
The campaign was targeting children aged between 0-59 months.
Zimbabwe launched a National Polio Vaccination Campaign last year targeting at least 95 percent of the estimated 2,5 million children under five years and the exercise was implemented in collaboration with Malawi, Tanzania, Zambia and Mozambique.
Poliovirus is very contagious and spreads through person-to-person contact. It lives in an infected person’s throat and intestines. It can contaminate food and water in unsanitary conditions.
It spreads through contact with the faeces of an infected person and droplets from a sneeze or cough of an infected person
“The goal of the campaign was to mitigate importation of the Polio Virus in the region from the affected countries by increasing the immunity of the children under five years in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe. The coverage for Round 4 in Bulawayo was 83 percent against a target of 95 percent,” read recent council minutes.
“Some of the possible reasons for not reaching the target could be religious beliefs, the highly mobile community and the denominator as the population of Bulawayo has since declined according to the 2022 census preliminary results.”
According to the council minutes, the city’s target for all four rounds was 101 821 children.
“We managed to vaccinate 76 684 which translates to 75 percent and 81 197 which is 89 percent during the send phase.
“A total of 80 483 children were vaccinated during the third round (79 percent) and the figure went up during the fourth round to 83 percent where 84 539 children received the vaccination,” read council minutes.
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