The perception of children’s vaccines has improved only in China, India and Mexico out of the 55 countries studied by the UNICEF.
According to the global flagship report, ‘The State of the World’s Children 2023: For Every Child, Vaccination’, unveiled by the UNICEF Maharashtra on Wednesday, the vaccine confidence marks a decline in over a third of the studied countries — the Republic of Korea, Papua New Guinea, Ghana, Senegal and Japan after the start of the pandemic.
The report warns of the growing threat of vaccine hesitancy due to factors such as access to misleading information and declining trust in vaccine efficacy.
The decline in vaccine confidence globally comes amid the largest sustained backslide in childhood immunisation in 30 years, fuelled by the Covid-19 pandemic. The pandemic interrupted childhood vaccination almost everywhere, especially due to intense demands on health systems, the diversion of immunization resources to Covid-19 vaccination, health worker shortages and stay-at-home measures.
Unveiling the report, Maharashtra Governor Ramesh Bais said “Immunisation is one of the world’s safest methods to protect children from life-threatening diseases, allowing them to live healthy lives and contribute to the society. We have the mechanism in place to reach out to every child and therefore India has shown the way to the world in routine immunisation. I appeal to the UNICEF to work with the Maharashtra government’s health department and help to reach the last mile that benefits not only the child but also the whole community.”
The UNICEF report says a total of 67 million children missed out on vaccinations between 2019 and 2021, with the coverage levels decreasing in 112 countries. In 2022, the number of measles cases was more than double compared to the previous year. The number of children paralysed by polio was up 16% year-on-year in 2022. When comparing the 2019-2021 period with the previous one, an eight-fold increase was seen in the number of children paralysed by polio, highlighting the need to ensure vaccination efforts are sustained.
The Maharashtra government vaccinates nearly 2 million infants and 2.1 million pregnant women every year with routine immunisation vaccines. The full immunization coverage of the state in the year 2022-23 is 100%.
Rajeshwari Chandrasekar, Chief of Field Office, UNICEF, said, “The State of the World’s Children 2023 report highlights India as one of the countries with the highest vaccine confidence in the world. This is a recognition of the government of India’s political and social commitment and demonstrates that the #largestvaccinesdrive during the pandemic has paid off in building confidence and strengthening systems for routine immunization to vaccinate every child.”
According to Nawin Sona, IAS, Secretary-2 Department of Public Health, Maharashtra, the health services to people were not affected during the pandemic. “Routine immunisation services were continued uninterrupted in Covid containment zones, buffer zones and other areas. As a result, the state’s full immunisation coverage was 97% in 2020-21. Even during the pulse polio campaigns, the coverage was more than 95%.”
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