City resumes polio vaccinations

City resumes polio vaccinations

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Local health authorities hope to reach more than 923,000 children
below the age of five during the third round of the nationwide
polio vaccination campaign in Jakarta on Wednesday.

"Hopefully, we can vaccinate 100 percent of targeted children,
or at least vaccinate the same number of children as during the
second round of the polio vaccination campaign in September,"
Jakarta Health Agency spokeswoman Zelvyno said at City Hall.

In the second round of the polio vaccination program,
authorities succeeded in vaccinating 96.23 percent of targeted
children thanks to aggressive door-to-door checks involving
volunteers and health workers. In the first round of the
campaign, 92.38 percent of targeted children were reached.

Zelvyno did not specify how her agency would encourage wary
parents to bring their children to vaccination posts.

"We will maintain the same procedures as in previous
vaccination rounds," she said.

First Lady Kristiani Herawati is expected to officially open
the third round of the vaccination campaign in Jakarta, in Mapar
subdistrict, Taman Sari district, West Jakarta.

During the second round in September, many parents were
reluctant to bring their children to one of the 8,028 health
posts across the city because of rumors of defective polio
vaccines.

The health agency denied the rumors, reassuring suspicious
parents the vaccines were safe.

The agency said some pediatricians were also advising parents
not to take their children in for a second round of vaccinations,
telling them one vaccination was sufficient.

However, most health experts agree that children ideally
should be vaccinated at least four times over a certain period of
time.

Polio reemerged in the country after more than a decade in
May, when a case was detected in Sukabumi, West Java, some 60
kilometers south of Jakarta. As of November, eight people have
died of polio across the country.