The Office of Public Health (BOG) does not have an Oral poliovirus vaccine (OPV) in stock. Doctor Djamiel Koesni coordinator of the vaccination programs in BOG said to the news media that children are being vaccinated against polio diseases with this vaccine. There were also no vaccines against mumps, measles and rubella (MMR), but they were delivered on Monday. She said that all the other childhood vaccines are available except OPV.
The delay is not with them but with the manufacturer. The vaccine should be delivered in August, but the BOG doctor said that they have received an email from the Pan-American Health Organization that the dose will be delivered at the end of this month.
According to the doctor, the schedule for vaccinating children was adjusted by the World Health Organization (WHO) two years ago. The schedule is now two IPV vaccinations and three OPV vaccinations per child. Since the WHO has been introducing the second IPV for years, now is the right time to do it.
Doctor Koesni said that they don’t want a polio outbreak. That is why the children are vaccinated against these diseases. They want to vaccinate all children, it is possible that someone comes from abroad with this disease and infects children. They don’t want that.
If there are children who are not vaccinated at all, they must be brought in by the parents to be vaccinated. There are children who have to get their OPVs, but that will happen before school starts. If it arrives at the end of September, they can also vaccinate these children before school starts in October.
RGD school program
The Regional Health Service (RGD) has been implementing school programs for years. Children are vaccinated at school through the RGD. If a child has missed the school program, the parents can always take the child to the outpatient clinics.
What the BOG has now noticed is that parents are no longer inclined to take their children to the school program. That’s because they fear the children will be vaccinated with COVID-19 vaccines.
According to the doctor, parents are reassured that they are not being administered COVID-19 vaccines. Koesni cannot indicate how many children still need to be vaccinated, because they do not work with numbers but with births. 10,000 children are born every year and that number must therefore be vaccinated.
