Merdeka.com – The Ministry of Health has asked local governments to increase the coverage rate for basic immunization for children under five and school-age children, because nationally it has only reached 58.4 percent as of October 2021.
The Acting Director General of Disease Prevention and Control at the Ministry of Health, Maxi Rein Rondonuwu, said that there is an imbalance between a number of provinces where the basic immunization rate is above 60 percent and most of which are not close to 60 percent.
“This is an immunization gap in several provinces. If we look at it, we need appreciation for several provinces, even during a pandemic, such as Banten, it can even reach 78.8 percent, slightly higher than the national target,” said Maxi, quoted by Antara, Tuesday (21/03/2020). 30/11).
Other provinces whose basic immunization coverage is above 60 percent include South Sulawesi, Bengkulu, South Sumatra, Bali, Gorontalo, Lampung, Bangka Belitung, East Java and Jambi.
“This should be a lesson for other provinces, why the province that I mentioned earlier can achieve or approach the target,” he said.
Maxi explained that the impact of low and uneven immunization coverage in several areas would lead to an accumulation of populations that are susceptible to diseases that could actually be prevented by immunization. At worst, there will be an extraordinary event (KLB) resulting from a viral or bacterial infection that causes disease, such as diphtheria or measles and rubella.
Maxi encourages each region to increase its immunization coverage because the national immunization program is carried out by local governments, starting from the village or sub-district level and up to the sub-district.
He said that currently outbreaks of diphtheria, measles and rubella have emerged in several parts of Indonesia. The emergence of outbreaks of this long-lost disease was due to the decline in immunization coverage in 2020 and 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Ministry of Health asks local governments to increase basic immunization which is only 58.4 percent [eko]
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