Women to get free tetanus jabs

JAKARTA (JP): The government will provide free anti-tetanus shots to 4.2 million women of reproductive age, a Ministry of Health official said.

Director General of Communicable Disease Control and Environmental Health Hadi M. Abednego said the vaccine will be given twice this year -- next month and in December. Another shot is planned for November next year.

The drive will target women between 15 and 39, especially those in areas considered prone to the infection; vaccination will prevent their babies from being infected with tetanus.

According to 1994 Central Bureau of Statistic data, there were 15.8 million women between 15 to 39 years old across the country.

Hadi said the vaccination will be given to all women, pregnant or not, married or unmarried.

"The shots will immunize them and their babies against tetanus infection," he said, The government intends to eradicate tetanus by the year 2000.

Tetanus is an acute infectious disease, often fatal, caused by a specific toxin from a bacillus which usually enters the body through wounds.

Tetanus is one of the seven infectious diseases, including polio and Hepatitis B, which can be lethal for the sufferers or cause disability if it is not prevented with vaccination.

Newborns can be infected during unhygienic delivery.

Hadi pointed out that in a great number of areas in Indonesia, women still prefer to give birth with uneducated traditional midwives at their side.

The midwives often cut the umbilical cord using a dirty knife, Hadi said. "That is how the babies are infected," he said. "The rate of tetanus infection is still high here."

Areas reported to have high rates of infection are West Java, East Java, South Sulawesi, Lampung and Aceh.

The numbers of reported tetanus cases in hospitals, however, has decreased, from 375 cases in 1992 to 296 in 1993. Out of the reported cases in hospitals, 81 people died of tetanus in 1993 and 123 in 1992.

Most of the tetanus cases in 1993 were recorded in West Java, East Java, Lampung, South Sumatra and North Sumatra. (ste)