By Onwa Ekor, Calabar
Cross River government has assured of steps to eliminate vaccine-preventable diseases especially measles, which is reported to be a leading cause of death among children.
Wife of the governor, Rev. Eyoanwan Bassey Otu, gave the assurance during the flag-off of the Integrated measles vaccination campaign at Primary Health Care Centre, Ikot Effanga, Calabar, recently.
She informed that the campaign seeks to cover at least 95 percent of eligible children in the state.
Otu, represented by the Special Adviser to the governor on Gender Mainstreaming, Dr. Inyang Asibong, stressed the need to vaccinate children within the ages of 9 to 59 months against measles, maintaining that, the goal of attaining 95 percent coverage would drastically prevent outbreaks in the state.
The First Lady intimated that vaccines to be administered during the exercise, billed for October 12th through 20, 2024, are free of charge, safe and critical to preventing health complications including brain infections, pneumonia and deafness among others.
The Commissioner for Health, Dr. Henry Ayuk, on his part maintained that the present administration’s efforts have been on the implementation of effective strategies to completely eradicate measles or reduce it to its barest minimum.
Commenting, the Director General, Cross River Primary Health Care Development Agency, Dr. Vivian Otu, informed that the exercise would be done at fixed and outreach sites.
“In addition to targeting children aged 9 to 59 months with the measles vaccine, the campaign will also offer HPV vaccinations to girls between the ages of 9 and 14; while routine immunizations will continue as part of ongoing efforts to protect residents of the state from vaccine-preventable diseases,” the DG said.
Among those who sent in goodwill messages were, World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, NPHCDA, AFINET, Medicinès San Frontiers, and SYDANI Foundation.
