In a major boost to public health services in Chhattisgarh, the State Government is all set to roll out Pentavalent vaccine from December this year, informed Dr Subhash Pandey, Immunisation Officer, the Chhattisgarh Government while addressing a two-day Regional Media Workshop on 'Routine Immunisation' here on Monday.
Pentavalent (five-in-one) vaccine is special vaccine to immunise infants against five fatal diseases like Diphtheria, Pertussis, Tetanus (DPT), Hepatitis B and HIB (Meningitis). The workshop has been organised by the State Government in association with UNICEF, CRC@25 Convention on the rights of the child and Samyak Foundation.
Experts citing the report of Sample Registration System Report 2012 informed that every year 1.4 million children below that age of five years die in India from largely vaccine preventable diseases like Pneumonia, Diarrhoea, measles and new born complication like Sepsis.
Detailing Chhattisgarh’s position in terms of vaccination Dr Subhash Pandey citing the report of National Family Health Survey (III) (NFHS), conducted in 2005-06 said that there has been substantial improvement in vaccination coverage since NFHS (II) report conducted in year 1998-1999. Full vaccination coverage, which was only 22 per cent in NFHS (II) increased to 49 per cent in NFHS (III).
Further it has been increased to 74.9 per cent as per latest Annual Health Survey 2012-13. Chhattisgarh’s performance is at par with national average which is around 75 per cent, he added.
According to Dr Pandey the insurgency-hit Kanker district registered highest administration of vaccine in 2012-13 (90 per cent), while Surguja recorded only 51.9 per cent of vaccination.
He further informed that considering Chhattisgarh’s performance in vaccination, the Central Government has decided to provide Pentavalent vaccine to Chhattisgarh by month of December this year. “We will start its administration from January 2015,” he said.
Senior Journalist Rahul Dev participating in the workshop also praised the State Government’s efforts and said Chhattisgarh has done phenomenal work in the field of vaccination. Dr Debashish Roy of World Health Organisation, India Office along with others officials of UNICEF also took part in the workshop.