The United Nations Children’s Fund has said it is targeting vaccinating 90 per cent of Nigerian girls, aged nine to 14 against Human Papillomavirus (HPV) infection by December 2024.
To this end, UNICEF said the second phase of the HPV vaccination of teenage girls would commence in other SouthWest states of Ekiti, Ondo and Oyo as well as Edo on May 27.
UNICEF cleared the air about misinformation, rumours, misconceptions and myths surrounding HPV vaccination of girls across the country, insisting that the vaccine remains the most effective way of preventing cervical cancer among girls and women.
UNICEF health specialist at the Lagos field office, Dr Ijeoma Agbo, disclosed this at a two-day media dialogue tagged, “Combating The Most Preventable Form Of Deadly Cancer Affecting Women and Girls Through Vaccination”, ahead of the flag-off.
According to Agbo, the vaccination recorded over 50 per cent success rate during the first phase which commenced in Ogun, Lagos, Osun and some Northern last year.
Agbo attributed the high burden of cervical cancer to poor access to HPV vaccination services, poor screening and treatment as well as low awareness among others.
She called on parents and guidance to make their teenage girls available for vaccination.
She said: “We are hoping to achieve at least 90 per cent vaccination target when it comes to HPV vaccination.
“If you look at the country, we will say we did well because if you look at the coverage, it is about 50-something per cent, but in the SouthWest we did not do as well as we would have hoped. Osun state was as high as 70 per cent after a lot of targeted approaches were being put in place. Ogun State is still at 40-something per cent while Lagos is at 43 per cent.
“But for states in the North, some did as high as 70 per cent, so that shows that in the South we have a lot of work to do.
“We are introducing in the remaining three Southwest states and Edo. These states are in close proximity to Lagos, Ogun and Osun which we introduced earlier and we can’t take it for granted. Whatever issues we have had might also happen in these states and that is why we are coming out earlier to look at the successes and the issues and see how we can use that to improve the introduction in other states and also in the states that we have introduced going forward.
“To the parents, we need their support, UNICEF has a mandate which is that every child and for this we are talking about our girls should live to survive thrive and fulfil their full potential in life. We do not want any girl in future to come down with cervical cancer and that is why this laudable initiative has been brought to the country”.
In his remarks, Programme Manager of UNICEF, Muhammad Okorie, said, the media dialogue was an opportunity to sensitise the public about the advantages of proven global interventions in the prevention of HPV through vaccination.