“How Vaccines Save Lives: World Health Organization Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus Addresses Vaccine-Preventable Diseases at World Health Assembly”

World Health Organization (WHO) Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Sunday that despite some doubts, there are currently more than 30 vaccine-preventable diseases and vaccines prevent more than 4 million deaths each year.

Tedros at the opening of the World Health Assembly (WHA) in Geneva from May 21-30, recalled that as a young man in Africa, disease had claimed the life of one of his brothers.

“The vaccine made smallpox oblivion,” said Tedros.

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“Yet millions of children across Africa and around the world – children like my brother – continue to be stricken by diseases for which children in other countries are being injected with vaccines.”

“That is why, in 1974, WHO launched the Extended Immunization Program (EPI), to ensure all children, in all countries, benefit from the lifesaving power of vaccines, initially for six major diseases namely diphtheria, pertussis (whooping cough), tetanus, polio, measles and tuberculosis,” he said.

Reporter: Asri Mayang Sari

Editor : Also

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