The Benue government said it has vaccinated more than 300 children in the temporary Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) Camp housing persons displaced from Yelewata against Measles Rubella (MR) and Oral Polio Vaccines (OPV).

The Yelewata IDPs are currently camped at the premises of the Makurdi International Market, in Makurdi.

The government was conducting a large-scale, integrated vaccination campaign to protect children from diseases like measles, rubella, polio, and HPV.

Benedicta Aboh, chief supervisor, Integrated Vaccination Campaign Fixed Team, told journalists on Sunday in Makurdi that the immunisation exercise started on Saturday.

Ms Aboh said that though they worked in Guma Local Government Area, the Yelewata IDPs fell within their coverage area, which was why they were in the camp to immunise the eligible ones.

The chief supervisor stated that more than 250 children were immunised on the first day.

She said they were administering routine immunisation for 0-23 months, MR for nine months to 14 years, OPV for 0-59 months, Human Papillomavirus (HPV) to girls of nine years, Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs), and Seasonal Malaria Chemoprevention (SMC).

Ms Aboh pointed out that they had yet to record a zero immunisation case, adding that there was no case of resistance so far.

The chief supervisor revealed that they plan to conduct more rounds of immunisation as the crowd was still large.

Also, the state immunisation officer,  Innocent Adega, told journalists on the telephone that they received 2.7 million doses of MR and 2.3 million doses of OPV.

The immunisation officer said the programme was an integrated immunisation campaign; therefore, other routine immunisations were also being administered.

Mr Adega explained that 1,110 fixed teams and 1,274 sweep teams (house-to-house) were distributed across the 23 LGAs for the exercise.

He said the exercise would last for 10 days, from the 18th to the 27th of October, adding that there would be two additional mop-up days.

Mr Adega said the exercise was going on smoothly, as there was no reported case of any challenge beyond their control. 

(NAN)