Anti-malaria vaccine uptake triples in Mangochi

Mangochi has registered an unprecedented rate in anti-malaria vaccine uptake owing to various interventions by healthcare workers in the district.

Authorities at Mangochi District Council told journalists on a tour on Wednesday that caregivers have fully embraced the campaign and are flocking to their respective health facilities to get their children vaccinated.

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The authorities disclosed that most of the children have received all the four required doses of the vaccine.

Health Surveillance Assistant (HSA) for Monkey Bay Community Hospital, Annie Matiasi, expressed satisfaction with the rate at which parents and guardians are getting their children vaccinated against malaria.

Matiasi said this gives hope that the district could eliminate the disease by 2030. She, however, disclosed that the campaign initially faced resistance due to social and religious beliefs, but this problem was overcome through sensitization.

“Most caregivers now understand the need for the vaccine. And when we ask them to explain what we have been telling them they are able to do so; hence, the huge turnout because they are the same people who took the message out to others so that they should also come forward with their children,” she explained.

Nankumba Health Centre HAS Robert Amisi shared Matiasi’s sentiments, stating that most community members could not appreciate the importance of the vaccine having come at the time Covid-19 vaccination campaign was also running.

The Ministry of Health has put 11 districts on routine malaria vaccine programme. Some of the districts included in the programme are Nsanje, Machinga, Balaka and Mangochi.