“In remote of
continents like Africa or Asia, a vaccine typically survives only five days
before it spoils due to improper storage. This leaves millions of children
without life-saving vaccines for preventable diseases. In order for vaccines to stay fresh, they
need to be kept between 0-8 degrees Celsius (32-46 degrees Fahrenheit). That’s a hard thing to accomplish in warm,
desert-like regions. And it will be even
harder if those places are remote and without electricity. Research
organizations are working hard to figure out how to make a portable, sturdy
and, most imperatively, reliable way to keep vaccines at that precise
temperature. To do that, researchers
looked to a basic technology for inspiration.”
Today, I am going give you an overview of “Vaccine delivery” in remote
high altitude areas of Nepal. As of now, I presume, each of us has received
vaccination shots against common childhood illnesses. We must also remember
that thousands and thousands of “unfortunate” children are still victim from
infectious diseases at this very hour like measles, tetanus, cholera, which are
otherwise easily preventable. My intention here is not to inspire or preach or
convince you of what needs to be done. Instead, I am going to show you what I have
personally observed and experienced the challenges while delivering vaccines in
remote high altitude areas. First thing first, let me dedicate this blog post
to those ladies, who are the foot soldiers for immunization in low income
settings like Nepal. They are known as Female Community Health Volunteers
(FCHV). They are directly involved in vaccinating the children in rural
communities. Without them, immunization program would falter!!
The focus here would be on the challenges that we face delivering vaccines
in remote and high altitude areas. So,
before jumping into vaccine delivery let me give you an overview of Nepal,
which is a land locked country in South Asia. The estimated population is
around 27 million. It is surrounded by two giants – China in the North and
India in the East, West and South. It is divided administratively into 5
regions and 75 districts. It comprises 3 ecological zones that run from east to
west – Southern Terai plain, Middle Hilly and High altitude Mountainous regions
in the north. Altitude increases from south to north. There are 16 -districts
in the mountain region. Among these 16 districts, my particular focus would a
district named “Mugu” – this is one district which has the lowest human
developmental index in Nepal.
In Mugu, there is a district health office (DHO) at district head
quarter. Its responsibilities lie in the provision of both curative as well as
public health services. There is only one PHC below district level. And there are
several health posts or sub health posts in every village development committee
(VDC), which is the lowest government administrative unit. Under each health
post or sub health post, there will be FCHVs, Outreach Clinic (ORC) clinics and
Expanded Program on Immunization (EPI) ORC that function to provide public
health services in the community. DHO is therefore a command centre for all
public health activities. In remote districts like Mugu, the sustainability of
energy requirement and transportation of health commodities are of the highest
priority to the district management. Once we have commodities like vaccine or
delivery kits, it cannot remain in district headquarter. These have to reach
people and if it is vaccine in particular, then it has to reach the children at
the earliest since it has to be kept cold within required temperature.
Energy is scarce in this part of the world. The basic source of energy
here is firewood. This does not help them maintain cold chain temperature for
vaccine. Next nearest energy source is kerosene, which is very expensive and it
is difficult to sustain for the whole district. So the next reliable source
would be either solar or wind or hydro energy. Here in Mugu DHO, the source of
energy is only solar energy. There is no reliable electricity source as of now.
As we are aware by now, the cold chain maintenance of vaccine is of
highest importance in vaccine delivery. If we fail maintain it properly due to
various reasons – human or technical error, we are committing crime to
humanity. You may ask,” Why is that?” It is primarily because vaccinating a
child with “impotent” vaccine is as good as giving child a poison. Therefore,
the continuous monitoring of temperature and documenting those numbers is very
important. However, our experience based on field observation or monitoring
visit tells that this is not always done. More than technical errors, we have
observed that it is in majority of cases due to human factors and partly technical.
This is one area many research organizations are utilizing their innovative
ideas that can address and solve both human as well as technical limitations in
the system.
The primary goal of EPI is to deliver safe and effective vaccine to the
children of every country, every province, every district and every village.
Apart from it, we also need to realize that getting vaccinated is the birth
right of every children and delivering complete dose of vaccine thereby fully
immunizing them. Therefore, reaching every child is has to be our mission and
we all have a moral responsibility to achieve this mission.
But a very practical question comes to us, “Are we able to achieve
these objectives?” This is challenging
but is also doable. Why sort of challenges do we have to face. Sometime we come across vials of oral polio vaccine (OPV) given to protect child from “paralyzing”
poliomyelitis. Unfortunately, we found in one of field inspection that many
vaccine vials had to be discarded because Vaccine Vial Monitor (VVM) showed
stage 4, which means they are damaged due to excessive temperature exposure. So you may ask, “Why does it happen?” It has
various reasons, as a result of human as well as technical limitation in those
areas. One of the main reason, many of times, we find vaccine carriers – old,
leaky and dilapidated conditions.
Another aspect of challenge in the delivery of vaccines is high drop
out that leads to incomplete dose(s) of vaccine received by the child. In this,
the role of mothers, health workers, community leaders, engineers, volunteers, teachers
and students are vital. Another
important target for vaccination, which we tend to miss from getting them
vaccinated, is all new borne babies. They are highly prone to infectious
diseases. Many of times, thousands of babies are still home delivered in low
income settings. Therefore, we need to serve these family and community living
in hardest to reach area of any geography the most. This is one challenge that
every government in low income setting are trying to solve to serve the most
impoverished population and save children from preventable diseases.
To understand the real scenario from family and community perspective, “why
many parents fail to vaccinate their children?” we have to understand the socio
– economic dynamics of the community. These are some of the scenarios which we
can observe or find in the community:
- There are parents, family or community, who will walk for hours and hours to get their children vaccinated,
- There are parents, family or community, who wants to vaccinate their children but they are not aware “where and when” to vaccinate
- There are parents, family or community, who will vaccinate their children but are busy with family works because they have to worry about what to eat next day more than getting their child vaccinated.
- There are some children, who are in the wild playing happily. Many of them are “Zero Dose” which means that they have not received even a single dose of vaccination.
There is another socio – economic aspect of a community which does
affect the health of the family as well as to reach them. In South Asian
society, there still exist millions of people considered “untouchables”. These
people are perennially pushed at the lowest of low in the socio – economic
strata. The children from these communities are usually those who are either
“Zero Dose” or “incompletely” vaccinated. And it is in this community, where
most of the disease outbreak occurs.
So as a vaccinator or local public health manager, s/he has to face a
practical question – how do we reach these children and vaccinate them? Vaccinator
has to think – how to reach there? She has to think – do I need to travel on
foot or on horse and is “per diem” covered or am I insured? Many of times, these
field level health workers have their own social responsibilities like we do. I have to say, these are real public health
dilemma that many of field level health workers have to go face because, on the
other hand - if s/he does not carry out her duty well, then somewhere, an “unfortunate”
child may get diseased or even lose his/her life!!
In remote and high altitude areas, we need to walk for hours and hours
to reach from one village to another. There is no other option. This is going
to be your daily routine, if you decide to live there or serve these
people. Sometime, we have to risk our
lives. Many health professionals have lost their life while in duty. Therefore, most of the time, vaccine transportation
is through human vehicle, walk for many hours to days even up to 10 days in
some places. It is definitely heavy and painful, while paid less and walk for
days to reach these children and vaccinate them. We have to acknowledge, the
office helpers, who are indispensable in carrying out vaccination program in
these remote high altitude areas. Sometime it is not easy to carry so they have
devised a local method – carry it on your, shoulder, back or head.
Finally, it is said, it takes a whole community to educate a child. In
our case, it takes a whole district or country to vaccinate each and every
child. However, there are challenges which we have to negotiate through, so we
reach each child and vaccinate them. So,
let me conclude this post with wisdom, “The best way to escape from a problem
is to solve it”
