Nigerian children on World Immunisation Day

Today, Nigeria marks World Immunisation Day with 2.1 million of its children unvaccinated. This means that this huge number of children never received any dose of vaccine against tuberculosis, polio, diphtheria, hepatitis B, measles, and yellow fever.

This is lamentable. On November 10 every year, the World Health Organisation seeks to highlight the importance of immunisation by giving children timely vaccination to prevent those killer diseases.

Nigeria comes up short. The country and its children are far off as the world marks Immunisation Day. This is dangerous for the country’s future.

Things have not always been this dismal. In the early 1990s, the country achieved an impressive 81.5 per cent of Universal Childhood Immunisation coverage under the National Immunisation Programme.
However, things have gone downhill ever since. In 1996, data showed a reduction to 30 per cent. In 2003, the coverage fell even further to 12.9 per cent.

This placed Nigeria among the worst performers on the UCI coverage scale. And it explains the country’s children’s woeful health status, which is only better than that of Sierra Leone, according to a report.

The WHO says a child is deemed to be fully vaccinated if he or she has received all the recommended doses of the vaccines.
For TB, whooping cough, polio and one or two other vaccines, the child is expected to receive as many as three doses, staggered over the first five years of life or beyond.

Vaccination saves lives, no matter the inconvenience. Unfortunately, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Guinea, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Sudan seem not well disposed to vaccines and are said to account for the highest doses of missed doses or zero doses. This is a clear sign of a lack of seriousness.

This poor showing leaves Nigeria far behind committed countries such as Ghana and Egypt. According to 2023 data, Ghana achieved up to 95 per cent vaccination coverage, even higher in some cases.

And that is due to the country’s intentional approach to safeguarding the health of its children. Egypt is just as good.

Immunisation is a great thing. As high as over four million deaths are said to be prevented globally every year through the careful implementation of vaccine programmes.

And from 2003 to 2005, more than 360 million children received measles vaccines globally.

Why is Nigeria so miserable in immunising its children? Several factors are to blame. Apart from a lack of political will, ethnic and religious considerations are quite a problem.
In some parts of the country, injecting children in the arms or dropping some liquids in their mouths in the name of preventing diseases is considered alien to their culture and beliefs.

In 2003, five northern states boycotted the polio vaccine. This was exacerbated by fears and rumours of its safety.

By 2015, Nigeria was ranked the second highest among countries whose people refused to take the polio vaccine.
Consequently, the disease spiked in the country. Insecurity is equally a hindrance as kidnapping for ransom and interminable armed conflicts force people from their homes, making it extremely dangerous for vaccination teams.

And there is always a shortfall of vaccines and a dearth of places to store them. All that the country gets, comes from overseas donors.

There is equally an unremitting haemorrhage of qualified healthcare personnel who continue to flee the country. Also, penetration of many local communities is an issue, worsened by the terrible roads. This explains why 4.6 per cent of children aged between 12 and 23 months are immunised in the urban areas, compared to just 1.1 per cent in the rural parts, as per reports. Those damaged roads should be repaired.

Nigeria must ramp up immunisation efforts for the sake of the children and its future. There is an urgent need to be intentional about safeguarding the health of children.
It is not merely a task for the government alone. All hands must be on the proverbial deck. The orientation agency under the Ministry of Information should embark on sensitisation on the significance of immunisation.

Communities not agreeable to it should be encouraged to buy into the lifesaving programme. The media and civil society organisations should also play a part, as should religious and community leaders. It should be stressed that vaccination is safe and free.

Where cases of monetisation are reported, they should be investigated and offenders sanctioned.

The brain drain in the medical sector can be reversed by fixing the issues that keep driving the professionals away.

One of such is remuneration and welfare. Medical personnel are uncomfortable with their low pay and a constricting work environment.

That should be resolved. Insecurity is a hydra-headed monster. It disrupts every aspect of life, from agriculture to education, and transportation to health. The government must curb it by any means possible.

The shortfall in vaccines can be corrected too. Nigeria should not depend on imports or donations from foreign countries for its every need, including vaccines. The tertiary institutions should be funded and encouraged to produce vaccines and storage facilities.
There are also grants that the government can access. Health literacy will equally help. So will maternal education. According to reports, immunisation coverage is more successful in the southern part of the country where health literacy and maternal education are reckoned to be more. It is easier to persuade an educated mother to present her baby for vaccination.

There is a lot to tackle in the children’s sector. The United Nations Children Fund says 18.3 million of them are out of school and over two million are malnourished.

Nigeria is also said to have the second highest burden of stunted children.

This is a fallout of malnutrition. This is scary. This is the very shape of unfolding calamity. Security experts say this is the nursery that feeds Boko Haram and other non-state actors in the country. Nigeria cannot continue like this. Something drastic and urgent has to be done.

The World Bank has voted $50m to Nigeria to help in mitigating children’s malnutrition. The global lender understands the problem in the country. How the government manages the fund will tell if it also understands the urgencies of the moment.