Almost 80,000 children and more than 13,000 pregnant women will benefit from an intensified immunisation drive in Maharashtra. The news comes from the state on the heels of an announcement earlier this year that the Government of India was stepping up its immunisation efforts through Indradhanush 2: an enhanced version of the Government’s vaccination drive […]
diphtheria
A district, a diphtheria scare and the WHO
Amidst a diphtheria scare which has reportedly claimed ten lives, a World Health Organization (WHO) team has encamped in the Banaskantha district of Gujarat. “A team of [the] WHO has been camping in the district and over 200 teams [of the] state health department are conducting door-to-door survey in affected talukas,” commented chief district health […]
Indradhanush 2: Government ramps up vaccination efforts
The Centre will expand its efforts to improve vaccination coverage throughout the country with “Indradhanush 2”, building on existing efforts to achieve ninety percent immunisation coverage against a plethora of infectious diseases. Launched in December 2014, Mission Indradhanush aimed to cover all children up to two years of age and pregnant women with vaccination coverage, […]
Diphtheria vaccine: Karnataka’s kids miss out
The diphtheria vaccine is an essential component of ensuring child health – making it concerning news that so many children in Karnataka are missing out on it. Vaccination coverage among children aged between five and six is just 48 percent in the state, with regards to the DPT booster-2 vaccine – targeting diphtheria, pertussis (or […]
Diphtheria strikes medical students
An estimated 25 medical students at the Gulbarga Institute of Medical Sciences (GIMS) in Kalaburagi district in Karnataka have contracted diphtheria. The outbreak of the disease has been traced to the GIMS Girl Hostel. Of the 25 cases, five have been treated at the outpatient department and were permitted to leave as their condition was […]
The need for the diphtheria vaccine
India needs to expand diphtheria vaccine coverage, doctors have said as they warn of dropping herd immunity in the country. Herd immunity refers to when vaccination coverage against a disease is sufficient to stymie the risk of further transmission. The diphtheria vaccine is credited with effecting a ninety percent reduction in disease cases between 1980 […]
Uttarakhand makes vaccination a must for schoolchildren
Immunisation rates in Uttarakhand fell by more than thirty percentage points in two years. Now the state is using stringent measures to drive immunisation rates upwards. Immunisation rates in the state fell to just 61.32 percent of children aged nine to eleven months in 2017-18. This was down from 99.3 percent coverage in the 2015-16 […]
Diphtheria scandal in Delhi hospital
Last December, an infectious disease hospital in Delhi exhausted its supply of medication for diphtheria. In the months that followed, it failed to replenish it. Multiple deaths ensued. Diphtheria is an infectious disease caused by the bacterium Corynebacterium diphtheriae. Symptoms – onset of which typically occur two to seven days after infection – include fever, […]
Diphtheria, a growing threat to young adults?
Diphtheria levels in India are at a thirty year high. Does this point towards failings in India’s vaccination efforts against the disease? Diphtheria is a potentially fatal infection of the respiratory tract, caused by the bacterium Corynebacterium diphtheriae. It is typically seen among children or those over the age of 25. However, India is seeing […]
Diphtheria and the importance of full course vaccination
Has limited access to medications caused a preventable disease to continue to claim lives in India? Diphtheria is a disease that has largely been reduced in a number of developed nations; in India however diphtheria still persists. Explanations for this typically dwell on the lack of access to both medical treatments and to the vaccinations that […]