By Che Palicte/Philippine News Agency
DAVAO CITY — The Department of Health in Region 11 (DOH-11) on Thursday called on the parents to allow their children to get vaccinated in next month’s school-based immunization.
DOH-11 officials admitted that many of the parents still fear getting their children immunized because of the Dengvaxia controversy in 2017.
In 2017, the DOH suspended the school-based dengue vaccination program after French drug-based vaccine maker Sanofi Pasteur made a statement that its product poses higher risks to people without prior dengue infection.
The announcement was followed by a torrent of reports about children dying from various complications attributed to the dengue vaccine.
In a media briefing here, Dr. Janis Olavides, DOH-11 national immunization program manager, clarified that the coming school-based immunization is safe and would enable children to get protected from diseases–particularly measles.
Based on the data of DOH, about 701,000 schoolchildren in Davao Region were enrolled in public schools, about 250,000 of whom are from this city.
Olavides said they have already immunized about 80 percent of the total population of schoolchildren in the city in 2016.
In 2017, the immunization rate dropped to 60 percent and in 2018 right after the Dengvaxia issue, the figures decreased further to 39 percent.
Despite the low turnout of the number of schoolchildren getting vaccinated every year, DOH-11 officials remain hopeful that they can reach a vaccination rate of 95 percent for the month-long immunization.
“We understand the fear of the parents that’s why we let them secure parent’s consent before we will give them the vaccine,” Olavides said.
She also added that students who fail to submit the parent’s consent will not be forced to get immunized. Instead, the teachers will get their names and submit them to the City Health Office for data collection purposes.
To further educate the parents on the safety of vaccines, Olavides said a team from DOH and Department of Education (DepEd) has given a series of orientation in various barangays in Davao Region along with personnel from the Department of the Interior and Local Government.
“We really encourage them to get vaccinated especially on measles for us to avoid an outbreak,” she said.
Dr. Raquel Montejo, DOH 11-local health division chief, said a total of 1,069 cases of measles were recorded in Davao Region from January to June this year.
A total of 33 deaths in the region were recorded last year; 25 deaths were recorded so far this year.
Montejo said the school-based immunization program is free of charge and it aims to protect schoolchildren from public schools to contract diseases such as measles and diphtheria.
The DOH’s 2019 school-based immunization program aims to vaccinate students from Kindergarten to Grade 7 with measles-rubella vaccine. Students from Grades 1 and 7 will also be given booster doses of tetanus-diphtheria vaccines.
Grade 4 female students, meanwhile, will get the Human Papilloma Virus vaccine to protect against cervical cancer.
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