The health zones of Ituri province have been experiencing a shortage of vaccine (BCG) against tuberculosis, intended for children under 5 years old, for several weeks.
Dozens of women line up every day in front of hospitals, health centers and other public and private health structures to have their infants vaccinated, the Radio Okapi reporter noted on Thursday, June 27.
Some breastfeeding women leave their homes around 4 a.m. with their babies to wait in line until around 3 p.m., before returning home, without their children receiving the vaccine.
One of them claims to have been sent home with her three-month-old baby, after waiting in vain to have him vaccinated. The health facility she went to informed her that only a small dose of vaccines was available for children aged 1 and 2 months.
In several non-state health structures, staff declare that they have no longer been supplied with tuberculosis vaccines by the health zones for more than three months.
The head of the Expanded Immunization Program (EPI) in Ituri indicates that his office received twenty-three thousand doses of BCG vaccine last May and this was distributed exclusively to hospitals and state health centers. The privates had not been served.
This May stock is already sold out. He also claims to have placed a new order allowing the recovery of children not yet vaccinated.
