Success of Owl Vaccination Strategy in Kalemie Health Zone: Dr. Yvan Mwamba Reports

2023-11-26 22:36:59

Two confirmed cases of polio and 47 others of acute flaccid paralysis have been recorded since last January in the Kalemie health zone (Tanganyika).

The chief medical officer of this health zone, Dr Yvan Mwamba reported these figures in an interview with the media.

“Thus, this year 2023, the Kalemie health zone recorded only two confirmed cases of polio while 47 cases of acute flaccid paralysis whose samples were sent to the INRB in Kinshasa for analysis“did he declare.

This doctor director of the Kalemie General Reference Hospital (Tanganyika) attributed this improvement to the implementation of the strategy called “owl”.

This consists of vaccinators going into households and vaccinating children at night under the supervision of either their mothers or fathers.

According to this doctor director of the Kalemie General Reference Hospital (Tanganyika), this “owl” strategy supports others used in the fight once morest poliomyelitis and other diseases.

« In relation to polio vaccination, we use the door-to-door strategy, and the second strategy we use is the owl strategy, where the nurses (IT) and health area coordinators go down to the households and vaccinate children at night under supervision of either the mother or the father. Under the pretext that we cannot score, because the father does not agree with vaccination and the mother agrees, so it is done at night when the father is absent ”, emphasized Dr Yvan Mwamba.

Another vaccination strategy “consists of the involvement of indigenous peoples (the pygmies) in vaccination activities as community relays in order to bring the population together.

« These refractory groups easily agree to be vaccinated if they find that a community relay is from their community », added this doctor

A third strategy is recovery through routine vaccination:

“There are information sheets that the community relays use and each time we identify a child receiving vaccination, the community relays direct the child with a token to the respective health area to go and take the vaccine. There are vaccination activities that IT organizes on site, in health areas and advanced activities, IT travel from one village to another to vaccinate.”

These vaccination strategies and in particular the owl strategy have paid off.

He also recommended that the Congolese state help health zones in “planning vaccination activities.

« This good planning helps us at the provincial level to properly coordinate our activities and achieve the objective and properly cover the target population that we are supporting. ”, pursued Dr Yvan Mwamba.

Finally, the head doctor of the Kalemie health zone mentioned cases of resistance to vaccination. These cases are often due to the religious beliefs of certain sects such as Watch Taywer, Red Kimbanguism, etc.

The town of Kalemie has two health zones: Nyemba and Kalemie. The Kalemie health zone includes 27 health areas including 8 in the town of Kalemie and 19 in the outskirts of the town.

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