Dates and venue: 9-12 December 2024 - Muscat, Oman Participants: Managers and Directors of the Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI) from Ministry of Health (MOH), National Immunization Technical Advisory Groups (NITAG) chairs or members, Immunization technical officers of WHO and UNICEF Purpose: Build capacity of EPI country teams to develop a ...

February 2025 - The Big Catch-Up (BCU) initiative, a targeted global effort to boost vaccination among children following declines driven by the COVID-19 pandemic, is making significant progress in addressing immunity gaps among children under five in six countries across the Eastern Mediterranean Region. Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, Sudan, Syri...

Dates and venue: 28 – 30 August 2024 - Yangon, MyanmarParticipants: Members of the Health Cluster (48 participants from 16 agencies). Purpose: The general objective was to ensure preparednessfor VPD outbreaks in the country and the specific objectives were to 1) ensure that an effective outbreak response plan is in place. 2)...

Dates and Venue: 25-27 September 2024, Kathmandu, Nepal Participants: WHO South-East Asia Regional Certification Commission for Poliomyelitis Eradication (SEA-RCCPE) members, Representatives of National Certification Committees for Polio Eradication (NCCPEs), National Containment Task Force, Ministry of Health (Nepal), donor and partner agenci...

Dates and venue: 9-13 December 2024 - Bangkok, Thailand Participants: A total of 40 participants from 12 countries including MOH officials, WHO and UNICEF attended the meeting. The countries represented were Afghanistan (WHO, UNICEF), Bangladesh (WHO, UNICEF, MOH), Bhutan (MOH), DPR Korea (UNICEF only), India (WHO, UNICEF), Indonesia (MOH, WHO...

Dili, Timor-Leste – A joint national and international review of the Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI) and Vaccine-Preventable Disease Surveillance (VPDS), combined with a post-introduction evaluation (PIE), was conducted in Timor-Leste from October 14 to 25, 2024. The assessment aimed to evaluate the country’s immunization progress, identif...

Dates: 21-23/10/2024 Participants:Shri R V Karnan, IAS, Commissioner, Health and Family Welfare; Managing Director, National Health Mission, Government of TelanganaG Sudheera, Joint Director, Child Health and Immunization, Government of TelanganaSyed F. Quadri, Programme Manager, JSI, DelhiMr David Damara, State Technical Manager, JSI, Hyder...

Dates: 26/11/2024 Participants: Officials from the Family Welfare Division, pediatricians and surveillance officers from sentinel sites, and technical officers from WHO Overview: A sentinel site performance review meeting on strengthening rotavirus (Rota) and invasive bacterial diseases (IBD) surveillance in Nepal was held on 26 November 2024 ...

In a landmark moment for child health, Chad has introduced three powerful vaccines against malaria, pneumococcal infections, and rotavirus nationwide, targeting nearly one million children under the age of one. This historic rollout, launched on October 25, 2024, aims to drastically reduce rates of preventable diseases and save thousands of lives i...

Nepal has reaffirmed its success in maintaining the elimination of Maternal and Neonatal Tetanus (MNT), a milestone first achieved in 2005. A recent post-validation assessment conducted in December 2024 confirmed that the country continues to maintain an incidence rate of less than one case per 1,000 live births in all districts nationwide. ...

Mozambique has made impressive strides in childhood immunization, as confirmed by the latest IA2030 zero-dose country rankings. The country, which ranked 12th in 2021, achieved a milestone by dropping out of the top 20 countries with unvaccinated children as of 2023. This progress highlights Mozambique's effective response to The Big Catch-Up (BCU)...

ThinkWell is pleased to present an updated version of the Immunization Delivery Cost Catalogue, or IDCC, the most comprehensive, current, and standardized database on the cost of delivering vaccines in low- and middle-income countries. First developed in 2017 by ThinkWell under the Immunization Cost Action Network (ICAN) project, the IDCC was previ...

PATH’s new Vaccine Cost Calculators for pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV) and rotavirus vaccine aim to help country-level decision-makers specifically in middle-income countries compare products and estimate vaccination program costs for different vaccine options. These simple, Excel-based tools aim to help with decision-making to support the in...

Published in September 2024, the report "The Value of Prevention for Economic Growth and the Sustainability of Healthcare, Social, and Welfare Systems" realized by The European House - Ambrosetti in collaboration with Vaccines Europe and IFPMA explores the economic, fiscal, and health return of investments in preventive healthcare. Preventative hea...

Several new vaccines including Rotavirus vaccine and Pneumococcal Conjugate Vaccine (PCV) were introduced under the Universal Immunization Program (UIP) in Bihar, India. The most recent introduction was PCV in 2017 in selected districts, with subsequent expansion across the states in 2018. During COVID 19 pandemic, routine immunization activities w...

Since the creation of the Chad Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI) in 1984 until 2018, vacination coverage (VC) of the third dose of vaccine protecting against diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis (DPT3) has never reached 50% according to WUENIC data. In 2019, Chad achieved a DTC3 CV of 50%, 52% in 2020, 58% in 2021, 60% in 2022 and 67% in 2023 ...

Nagaland is a mountainous state nestled in the hills of north-eastern India. It is a land of multiple languages, dialects and home to 17 major hill tribes.Considering the diversity and difficult terrain, it is challenging to deliver health care services to the community, including child vaccination. This has prompted multiple state-level del...

The Immunization Economics Community of Practice management team are excited to announce the launch of the new website. With this refresh, it is easier for users to find resources and navigate the website. You can now find a resource library in which every immunization economics resource ever published can easily individually be found through a com...

PAHO has launched two web pages with resources to help countries improve their communication about vaccination and increase demand for vaccines. The two pages are part of the Immunization Toolkit under the “Social communication and demand generation” tab, available here.The first page, “Behavioral science: Vaccine demand and confidence,” explains w...

PAHO publishes the Immunization Newsletter four times a year in English, French, Portuguese, and Spanish. Its purpose is to facilitate the exchange of ideas and information on immunization programs in the Region of the Americas and beyond. It has been published since 1979 in English and Spanish, with French and Portuguese versions beginning in 2001...