by Irma a. Guhit
SORSOGON CITY July 5 (PIA) .... "We are now ready to say that in the province of Sorsogon , the Measles Rubella Supplemental Immunization Activity (MR - SIA) is now 84 % implemented", Dr. Napoleon Arevalo, representative of the Department of Health, RO 5- Center for Health Department (DOH-CHD) in the province of Sorsogon said in a report forwarded to this office.
He said that the efforts of the government to really provide the constituency the needed services specifically on health are urgently implemented and are given wide acceptance by the people specially in all areas now here in the province.
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"The willingness of mothers to submit their children for vaccination and to be provided health care assistance is now well-accepted and supported by the local chief executives", Arevalo said.
The campaign launched this year by DOH is one of the government's interventions to eliminate the fear for measles that usually has a grave effect to children and lactating mothers when affected.
According to Dr. Arevalo, the cohesive efforts provided by the health workers in the barangays have made a very positive influence on mothers who voluntarily and readily submitted their children to vaccination.
Media campaign done nationwide and the efforts extended by local officials supported by the members of the local media community here in the province also contributed to the fast accomplishment of the program, he said.
"We are very thankful that today here in the province we are left now only with 16% of identified children to be vaccinated. Hopefully before the third quarter of this year we can already achieve the 100% target implementation of the MR-SIA ", Arevalo stressed.
"In our scheduled visits to the municipalities and barangays , mothers and relatives of these young children who are identified by our health workers for immunization had been made already available for vaccination. Although done door to door those who were not around during their scheduled dates were brought by their parents to the barangay health stations for vaccination", he said.
Meanwhile in a submitted report forwarded to PIA Sorsogon yesterday, Charito Diaz, in charge of the MR-SIA activity reports that two municipalities in the second district has already conducted a 100% MR-SIA implementation.
Sta Magdalena has already accomplished MR-SIA to their target of 3171 children and Matnog with a total of 7,228 children given immunization., both have successfully conducted the 100% implementation of the program
Ms Diaz said that Mayor Alejandro Gamos of Sta Magdalena and Mayor Emilio Ubaldo of Matnog has provided the easy facilitation of the implementation of the program together with their health workers.
MR-SIA is now on its 99% implementation in Juban ;98% in Pilar and Donsol while in Casiguran and Castilla its now on its 97% implementation with Irosin having a 96 % accomplishment also.
Other municipalities are now almost in their 87-90% implementation .
Meanwhile because of their big population like the city of Sorsogon and the municipalities of municipalities of Bulan, Gubat and the others are still below the 90% implementation.
To date, according to the report, the program has a target of 159,391 children to be immunized. A total of 156,415 has already been visited and a total of 134,465 children were already provided immunization broken down as follows: for 9-11 months 4,283; 12-25 mos 16,115 and 24-95 mos with a total of 114,067.
Diaz also said that the implementation of the program has been within the time frame and within the expectation of the Department of Health program implementation target.
Public health and safety is now the emerging trend of the DOH primary targets and sed on the thrust of the Aquino Health Agenda program according to Arevalo.
All DOH instrumentalities and facilities has beeb tapped to support and collaborate effectively in the cohesive implementation of all health programs, he said.
"We can say that here in the province of Sorsogon, public health concerns are now becoming more on the preventive and reflective side and not just reactive . Just like in the Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) where mitigation is the best service we can do to abate certain situations, so does goes the saying, "An once of prevention is better than a pound of cure"., Arevalo disclosed. (PIA-Sorsogon)