DOHA: The Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) recently organised a workshop to train health workers for the national immunisation campaign against measles, mumps and rubella (MMR). The campaign running from October 17 to November 14 will focus on children between one to 13 years of age.
Around 255 health workers from both governmental and private health facilities participated in the wiorshop that mainly focused on proper implementation of the campaign and the ensuring safety and effectiveness of the vaccines used.
“The MMR- vaccine campaign is the major way to protect society from these diseases and enhances national efforts to get rid of them,” said Dr Sheikh Mohammed Al Thani, Director of Public Health Department, MoPH.
He stressed that since its implementation in seventies by the World Health Organisation (WHO), the immunisation programme has become part of public healthcare system round the world and has found much success in putting outbreak of various diseases on check. WHO statistics indicate that the number of deaths from measles have fallen by 79 percent from approximately 550,000 deaths were recorded in 2000 to 114, 900 cases in 2014. New statistics show that more than 17million lives have been saved due to increased coverage of vaccines.
The incidence of measles cases in Qatar have dropped rapidly during the last few years, from 160 confirmed cases in 2012 to 18 cases in 2015. Also 21 cases of Mumps and seven cases of Rubella were detected in 2015.
The campaign is organised in collaboration with Ministry of Education and Higher Education and Primary Health Care Corporation, Hamad Medical Corporation, Qatar Petroleum and Sidra Medical and Research Center.
