Lagos to immunise 4.9 million children against Polio

Kazeem Ugbodaga

The Lagos State Government says it is targeting the immunization of 4.9 million children in the ongoing National Immunization Plus Days, NIPDs, which kicked off in the state at the weekend.

Special Adviser to the Governor on Public Health, Dr.Femi Onanuga who made this known at a stakeholders meeting in Shomolu Local Government area of Lagos, said the unfortunate discovery of three cases of Wild Polio Virus, WPV, in Borno State last year August, as well as influx of migrants to Lagos State on a daily basis, made it crucial for the State to participate in the various immunization campaigns to sustain her success story.

Onanuga said in additional to the house to house immunisation against polio, 752 fixed posts would also be mounted across the State, adding that a number of workers had been trained to for the exercise

The special adviser said the immunistion interventions deployed in 2016 included strengthening of routine immunization, strengthening local and international border activities, among others.

He stated that the goal of the government was to increase the total number of children who received Oral Polio Vaccine as this would boost the herd community, while encouraging parents and wards to continue to patronize the primary healthcare facilities in the state for free routine immunization services.

According to him, to ensure the success of this year’s campaign, many training sessions had been conducted to strengthen the capacity of relevant health workers at the State, Local Governments and Ward levels.

“The NIPDs would involve house-to-house, transit and fixed post teams. Children at homes, markets, churches, mosques, major car parks and social event avenues would be specifically target. A population of 4,964,284 children is expected to be covered in this round.

“The house-to-house and transit components of these teams will administer only OPV to children aged 0-59 months irrespective of their status,” he said.

The Chairman of Shomolu Local Government, Williams Lawanson and his Bariga counterpart, Mr Sanya Osijo appealed to parents and guardians to support governments’ effort to kick polio out of Nigeria by immunizing their children and wards.

However, the stakeholders’ meeting which was attended by nursing mothers in the council area also had in attendance representatives of international partner agencies, including the World Health Organisation, WHO and others.