Rwanda has
been so successful at fighting measles that next month it will be the first
country to get donor support to fighting rubella too. Rubella causes a rash
that resembles the measles rash, making it difficult for health care workers to
tell the difference. Every year almost around 112,000 children, mostly in Africa,
South Asia and the Pacific Islands are born with handicaps caused by the mother’s
rubella infection. On March 11th there will be a nationwide three
day vaccination campaign with a combined measles-rubella vaccination and hopefully
reaching nearly five million children up to age fourteen. Christine Mcnab, a
spokeswoman for the Measles and rubella initiative, Stated “Rwanda has proved
that it can suppress measles and it would benefit from the newer, more
expensive vaccine.
The article was
flawed in that it did not provide more evidence supporting why they feel that the
rubella vaccine specifically will be effective, such as success rate of those
who have been given the vaccine already. If the rubella vaccine was to be as
successful as the measles vaccine it would be greatly beneficial since so many
children die a year from rubella in poor countries such as Rwanda. The article was
good overall in that it provided many statistics on how successful the measles vaccine
was in Rwanda, such as the death among children declined seventy-one percent
since 2000 and ninety-percent of Rwandan children no are vaccinated twice
against measles, as cases have been near zero since 2007. It is imperative that
effective vaccines such as the one for measles and rubella are being discovered
and distributed so the health in Rwanda can improve and thus improving global
health.
Bria Gill
2/26/13
12:50 PM
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