WEEK 2 ASSIGNEMENT.

 

Three High priority strategies.

Provision of adequate resources for routine immunization activities.

Increase resources for all tiers of government in Nigeria for routine immunization activities, i.e. the National; states; local government, communities and health facilities.

Rational for this strategy.

This is important because scarce resources, both human, materials and financial resources are critical to achieving high immunization coverage. In Nigeria, resources especially human resources for health that are needed for a well trained staff to fully provide routine immunization services are scarce.

Secondly, vaccine management has serious challenges as many fixed post that are supposed to provide access to continuous provision of 24 hours immunization services do not have cold chain vaccine management equipment for all-round 24 hours immunization services.

Thirdly, finance for conducting immunization outreaches programs are grossly inadequate.

What is expected to be achieved with this strategy.

Adequate funds for overhead cost for health workers who will be trained to provide uninterrupted vaccination for all eligible children.
Financial resources to provide solar direct drive vaccine refrigerators for all immunization fixed post. This will enable availability of potent vaccines for adequate immunization services.
Funding for immunization outreaches will help ensure no child is left behind or missed in provision of immunization services.

Expected outcome from this strategy.

Immunization coverage will increase by at least 20% in the next three 24 months.

 

Integrate routine immunization with other health facilities treatment conditions.

Routine immunizations should be fully integrated to the primary health care centres routine health care services. This will ensure that every opportunity is made open for all children to access routine immunization services at any time that will be convenient for both eligible children and their mothers/care givers.

In addition, working mothers/caregivers will be able to attend to their other income generation activities for the family and still be able to visit the health centres at their own convenience, as scheduled dates and times for immunization will be eradicated.

What is expected to be achieved with this strategy.

Significant reduction in cases of unimmunized children in Nigeria.
Reduction in bottlenecks for routine immunization for eligible children.
Routine immunization will be considered as routine primary health care services.

Expected outcome from this strategy.

Routine immunization will receive the required attention and funding.
Herds immunity for many of the vaccine preventable diseases will increase.

 

 

 

 

3 . Full community Involvement in all routine immunization activities.

Community involvement in routine immunization is currently limited to sensitization activities and advocacy in Nigeria. However, the roles of community should cover:

Training of communities focal persons on the importance of routine immunization to social and health protection of all eligible children, households, families and communities. This focal persons will then be strengthened to scale down to the larger communities members.
Involvement of communities members in all forms of planning for immunization activities. This should include household and community mapping, vaccine needs, resources required for adequate and appropriate vaccination, planning for adverse reaction for vaccination and plans for managing such reactions. The outcome of the planning will increase full ownership of community in routine immunization activities.
Full community involvement in planning and evaluation for routine immunization activities such as:

Methods for collecting routine immunization data.
Information on routine immunization coverage at the community.
Age and sex distribution of immunization coverage.
Reasons for the level of routine immunization coverage.
Health and social implication for unimmunized children.
How to track immunization defaulters at the community level.
Plans to improve immunization coverage in their respective communities.

 

What is expected to be achieved with this strategy.

Increase community ownership of routine immunization
Reduce cases of immunized children.
Increase the chances of community investment in routine immunization.

Expected outcome from this strategy.

Community driven routine immunization programme.
Ensure sustainability of routine immunization at community and national level.
Overall improvement in health of infants and children less than five years.

 

What is going to be the situation if these strategies are not adopted?

Continuous decline or slow progress in routine immunization coverage in Nigeria.