Health Secretary Enrique T. Ona announced today that Barangay Suaverdez in the municipality of Anao, Tarlac province is the first barangay in the country to achieve its target of zero missed child and a 95% house marking accuracy during the month-long, nationwide “Iligtas sa Tigdas Ang Pinas” campaign.
The Department of Health (DOH) campaign’s partial results revealed that 11.8M children (63%) of the targeted 18M children aged 9 months to below 8 years old were already vaccinated against Measles (M) and Rubella (R) as of 10 AM today.
Among the top three regions with the highest percentage of the vaccinated children were Region IX (Zamboanga Peninsula), who has been a consistent top performer since the first week of the campaign, with 81% (or 565,255) of their 695,329 eligible children; Region XII (SOCCSKSARGEN) with 80% (or 658,160) of their 818.197 eligibles; and Region XI (Davao Region) with 79% (or 688,009) of their 868.764 children.
Meanwhile, ARMM (Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao), who were able to start last April 11 only, reached 25% of their total eligibles or 181,079 of the 733,414; Region VIII (Eastern Visayas) with 54% (or 478,648) of their 880,574 children; and CAR (Cordillera Administrative Region) with 57% (or 190,503) of their 336,740 children and Region IV-A (CALABARZON) also with 57% (or 1.37M) of their 2.4M children.
The National Capital Region (NCR) accomplished 63%% of the eligible population or 1.41M of the 2.2M children.
“To enable these areas to catch up, the campaign will be extended until May 30 this year,” Secretary Ona announced, adding that the objective is to reach at least 95% coverage of eligible children nationwide as part of the Millennium Development Goal #4 (reduction of child morbidity and mortality).
Ona appealed to mothers and caregivers whose children have not received the vaccine to have them vaccinated within the next few days and to all private doctors to advise their clients to allow the vaccinating teams to check their immunization cards for validation of vaccines received.
To measure the success of this campaign, an internal and external rapid coverage assessment (RCA) after a barangay has declared completion of vaccinations is conducted. The internal RCA team is composed of the DOH Regional Center for Health Development and the Provincial Health Office while the external team is composed of the national DOH and the World Health Organization (WHO) and other partners. A measles-free certification will be given to the areas that will meet the criteria of “no missed child and no measles cases for 3 months after the campaign.” -30- DOH
