I noticed in our reading that Afghanistan has one of the highest numbers of death of children under that age of 5. I found out from an article that in 2006 there was a immunization campaign done in Afghanistan supported by UNICEF. Their objective was to reduce child measles mortality by 90 percent and to elimnate maternal and neonatal tetanus. Afghanistan's infant mortality rate is very high at 257 per 1,000 live birth. Measles is a major cause of child death , and tetanus which results from unsanitary conditions at delivery, these are leading killers of mothers and their babies. In 2006 during this campaign more than 4 million children under 5 were vaccinated against measles and an estimate 4.2 million of childbearing age recieved tetanus vaccines. Mothers who were vaccinated passed tetanus immunity on to their children for the first nine months of life. This campaign helped but more help is still need.
I found that non-immunization of child may impact my future work. Someday I do want to own my own center and I must be firm with parents that their children must be up to date with immunizations.
Jamie, I enjoyed reading your post. I agree too that immunizations are very important in the child care center. Our center cares for children ages 6 weeks to 12 years old and some of our children our two year olds go through the biting phase and this would be a time the immunizations are very important. While that behavior is not tolerated it is a phase that we expect to occur.
ReplyDeleteWhat I am careful to do when enrolling new children is to request that the School Entrance Form is completed by the child's physician prior to the first date of enrollment. While the Department of Social Services does give a little leeway for physicals I find it very difficult to obtain the information from the parent's after the child is enrolled.
Your information Afghanistan was very insightful. Just to think that they had to do a campaign just for immununization and we here in the United States have access and will not take advantage. Why is that?
Jamie,
ReplyDeleteAfter reading your post it really made me think. I knew that immunization were important, but I never realized how important they are. Maybe because I don't have children or the fact that I just took for granted that they have and must be done.
I know in our district how much they stress the importance of recieving the immuniztion records but never took the time out to acknowledge it. The information you talked about with the children in Afghanistan really made me realize why it is necessary for our children to have them. Thanks for the great information.
Jamie,
ReplyDeleteGreat post. Immunizations are so important to keep up to date. Having two children of my own I know that these are not easy appointments especially as the child ages and they are aware of what is about to happen. It is hard to make a child understand that what may only hurt for a brief second could keep them from hurting for a very long time if they were to actually get sick from one of the horrible diseases that we are protecting them from.