Some residents of Gwagwalada Area Council have prevented their children from receiving polio vaccine being administered on children in the ongoing immunisation in the FCT.
A correspondent of the News Agency of Nigeria who monitored the exercise on Tuesday in Gwagwalada, reports that some parents prevented health workers from immunising their children.
They cited the outbreak of Monkey pox in some states as their reason for preventing their children from receiving the polio vaccine.
One of the parents, Mariamu Alli, said she was not disposed to granting access to health workers to vaccinate her children due to the rumour about the outbreak of monkey pox.
Alli said: “The rumour in town is getting us scared; we don’t want to take any chances.”
Oluwadera Wisdom said though her children had received polio vaccine in the past, the news about the outbreak of Monkey pox has scared her from presenting her children for immunisation.
However Ezeonu Chizaram, who dismissed the outbreak of monkey pox as rumour, allowed health workers to vaccinate her children.
Chizaram said: “This vaccine is for our children and the government has spent a lot of money to make it available.
“People are rejecting the vaccine out of ignorance.”
Reacting to the development, Dr. Adeyemi Adeniran, the council’s Head of Health and Human Services department, told NAN that the vaccine was essentially meant to eradicate polio.
Adeniran said: “This is not a vaccine to reduce the number of a certain sex in the society, but to eradicate polio.
“By our status we shouldn’t be among countries with polio.’’
On his part, the Supervisory Councillor for Health, Alhaji Usman Noma, promised that the council would continue to sensitise parents on the importance government attached to immunisation.
Noma said: “The vaccine will help in eradicating polio from the society.
“The rumour is wrong and it will not help our children. That is why we are out to talk to our people not to reject the vaccine.”
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