ZAMBOANGA CITY — The City Health Office confirmed that four children have died due to measles as of March 2 this year.
Dr. Dulce Amor Dagalea-Miravite, OIC chief health officer, on Tuesday disclosed that two of the four were from Barangay Calarian while the other two were from Barangays Tumaga and Zambowood.
Miravite said the youngest among the four fatalities was a three-month-old baby boy and the oldest was a seven-year-old girl.
Miravite disclosed that they have so far recorded 222 suspected cases of measles.
The City Health Office has launched a catch-up immunization for Mumps, Measles and Rubella (MMR)in a bid to eliminate if not lessen the number of measles cases following the declaration of an outbreak of the disease.
So far, Miravite said they have already immunized 24,655 children since the start of the catch-up immunization on February 19. The immunization campaign ends March 23.
She disclosed they have also recorded 857 children, whose parents refused to be immunized due to apprehension brought about by the Dengvaxia scare.
“If they really don’t want to get their kids vaccinated, we cannot do anything about it. We have done our part,” she said saying they tried to convince the parents to no avail.
The City Health Office aims to immunize with MMR some 121,000 children aged six to 59 months old to protect them from Mumps, Measles, and Rubella.
The immunization campaign is part of the pro-active measures to address the measles outbreak in this city. Teofilo Garcia, Jr/PNA-northboundasia.com