WHO asks India, others to step up immunisation among children

India’s DTP coverage that rose steadily to reach 91% in 2019 dipped to 85% a year later due to the pandemic

The World Health Organisation on Wednesday asked India and its neighbours in South East Asia to rapidly accelerate the routine immunisation programme with lakhs of kids – mostly Indian - suffering from lack of vaccination since the beginning of the pandemic last year.

“The vulnerability to vaccine preventable diseases has increased with the pandemic disrupting essential immunization services and surveillance for vaccine preventable disease. Though efforts are being made, much more needs to be done specially at the sub-national levels,” Poonam Khetrapal Singh, Regional Director, WHO South-East Asia said at the 74th Regional Committee meeting in Kathmandu.

Recalling the strong progress made until the onset of the pandemic, she said by 2019 the south east Asia region was at its historically best position with 91 per cent coverage with three doses of DTP vaccine. Ten of 11 countries including India had achieved more than 90 per cent DTP3 coverage.

But routine immunisation services were among the first casualties of the pandemic. India’s DTP coverage that rose steadily to reach 91 per cent in 2019 dipped to 85 per cent a year later. In July, a WHO-UNICEF study showed that nearly 3.5 million Indian children missed their vaccination in 2020 -- the highest in the world. The number of such missing children was 1.4 million in 2019.

For the WHO south east Asia region, the number of unvaccinated or partially vaccinated children increased to 4.9 million as against 3 million in 2019. Surveillance of vaccine preventable diseases was also affected.

The estimated coverage with the first dose of measles-containing vaccine in the Region fell to 88 per cent in 2020 compared with 94 per cent in 2019. Similarly, coverage with the second dose of measles-containing vaccine declined to 78 per cent in 2020 compared with 83 per cent in 2019.

For India where 2.6 crore babies are born every year measles remains a big concern, as well as outbreaks of diseases like diphtheria which can spread quickly where people are unvaccinated.

The Covid-19 pandemic also resulted in surveillance gaps in several countries and delayed implementation of mass vaccination campaigns and other immunisation-related activities, the WHO said in a statement.

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