Songs on vaccinations or call it, immunisation, have been loud from time immemorial but it is regrettable that some people still show disdain to the process which is solely life-saving. Stakeholders hold that vaccination saves the life of the immunised as well as protects future generations from diseases. Unbelievable therefore to comprehend why despite health benefits preached by experts, some people gifted with the sometimes rare fruit of the womb, still excel in vaccination indifference. Why toy with irreplaceable human life?
Ignorance and superstitious beliefs, bookmakers say, are to blame for the dangerous reticence shown the vaccination operation by some groups of people from North to South and East to West. Even starting the process just to abandon it halfway still thwarts the good intentions. Information that about 23.3 per cent of under one-year-old children in the country are not well vaccinated and that 19 per cent of those who start vaccination schedule at birth do not complete the vaccination calendar, is to say the least, disturbing.
Reports hold that vaccination against a range of bacterial and viral diseases is an integral part of communicable disease control world-wide. This, as vaccination against a specific disease not only reduces the incidence of that disease, it also reduces the social and economic burden of the disease on communities. Very high immunisation coverage, it is said, can lead to complete blocking of transmission for many vaccine preventable diseases.
Experts hold that pre-empting a disease is far better than treating it once it strikes. Why shun vaccination just to turn around and run helplessly when the child’s life is already in danger? It is known that dangerous diseases like poliomyelitis, tuberculosis, measles, rubella, hepatitis et al, are easily preventable through early and complete vaccination, failing which victims can either go handicap or even lose their lives. It is also well known that complications resulting from these careless diseases can be very costly to the family of those suffering from them.
Health, they say, is wealth. This explains why every responsible governments almost always spend time and money in subsidising vaccinations and getting people to comb the nooks and crannies of the country to do so. Snubbing the operation as some parents are said to be doing is not only robbing the State of scarce resources that would have been channelled to other productive sectors of the country but as well depriving her of valuable human resources. People who are handicapped or killed by curable diseases for want of vaccination would have otherwise comprised valuable assets for the country’s socio-economic development.
Those still dragging their feet or spreading false information about the different vaccination campaigns in the country absolutely need to turn a new leaf. Those vested with the authority to get the vaccines through may as well need to innovate in their sensitisation campaigns. Another life lost from a disease that would have been averted through administering a vaccine is one more life too much. The shyness of parents must be made to belong to history.