April 5, 2018

Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu of Ondo State has urged primary healthcare workers to brace up to the task and ensure every child gets vaccinated against vaccine-preventable diseases in the state.

Akeredolu made the plea on Thursday in Akure at a meeting with the Task Force members on Polio eradication and routine immunisation.

He said: “As caregivers, you need to examine your attitude to clients coming to your health facilities in order not to discourage them from returning for important services.

“I promise to continue to provide the needed leadership to enable the health sector, especially the state Primary Healthcare Development Board, to deliver on its mandate of routine immunisation in the state.’’

The governor said that safeguarding children from vaccine-preventable diseases through adequate and qualitative delivery of immunisation services must be pursued with unrelenting vigour.

In his remarks, Dr Taye Oni, the Permanent Secretary, State Ministry of Health, said that the state had always been in the fore-front in providing routine immunisation to children.

Oni, while lauding the efforts of the governor in ensuring the participation of the state in all national immunisation exercises, said that the state would continue to maintain its leading position.

Earlier, Mr Tunde Ayoade, the United Nations International Children Education Fund (UNICEF), representative in the state, said that body would continue to support the state.

“We have been given Ondo State necessary support to ensure that it moves forward, and we will continue to do so.

“We also plead with Gov. Akeredolu to employ more technical staff to enhance performance for polio immunisation and to bridge the gap we are experiencing as soon as possible,” he said.