Big deal? You bet

Jan 20th, 2011 2:58 PM UTC
By Ginny Wolfe

Tomorrow, the BBC will be at the Langata Health Center in Nairobi to do a story on the new pneumococcal vaccine now being given here, although the official vaccine launch is not until Valentine’s Day. ONE photographer Morgana Wingard and I are there today, so we fully intend to take credit for scooping the BBC.

Babies at Langata Health Facility in Nairobi receive the pneumococcal vaccine

Here’s why this new vaccine is so important: In the developing world, pneumonia kills in the neighborhood of 1.4 million kids every year. Pneumococcal, the deadliest strain of that illness (and a major cause of what we might call “regular” pneumonia), kills 800,000. Call me crazy, but this new vaccine to prevent pneumococcal is a Really. Big. Deal.

We are interested in seeing the soup-to-nuts operation of delivering a new vaccination in a single health facility so the good folks at GAVI have made our arrangements. (Pardon while I digress for a moment to praise GAVI for what it is doing to help keep the poorest children on the planet alive and healthy. And let me say thanks to those –- especially the United States -– who help make their work possible.)

Mothers wait in line for their children to receive the pneumococcal vaccine

The cold storage repository for the pneumococcal vaccine

There weren’t many people here when we arrived around 9 a.m. But, before long, moms with small babies were streaming in, signing in, weighing their babies and getting in the vaccine “bench line.” (They sit in order on long benches and slide over each time the next client is admitted to the vaccination room. This is the only place in Kenya I have seen people actually form a queue.)

Some have come for their babies’ regular vaccinations and only learn of the new pneumococcal vaccine when they arrive. Others had heard of the vaccine through community health workers deployed to spread the news and, even though up-to-date with their babies’ regular shots have brought them in for the pneumococcal.

This health center is the Langata (sometimes called Kibera) District’s regional distribution center for the 36 clinics within the district. They collect all of the vaccines from the Regional Disbursement Center and, since they must maintain the cold chain to ensure the efficacy and safety of the vaccine, haul them back to Langata in well-used, white Styrofoam coolers. There, they are stored in an upright, avocado green refrigerator that looks older than I am –- which is pretty old. But, it works and that’s what counts. They are then divided up and dispersed to the 27 clinics in the District that have trained personnel to give the vaccines.

Eunice, head nurse at Lagata Health Facility in Kenya, prepares a pneumococcal vaccine

The vaccine is in a clear bottle with a red top and is given in the child’s right leg. Some are quite stoic with these multiple sticks with long needles. Others are indignant, outraged, and generally unhappy. Can’t say as I blame them.

Lavendar and Valum are just receiving their vaccines and happen to be two of the stoic. Their moms hold the ubiquitous purple-pink booklets that contain their babies’ medical history and vaccinations.

While all of this may seem routine and boring, believe me when I tell you that for these mothers and babies this new vaccine is anything but routine and boring. It has the potential to save the lives of hundreds of thousands of children under the age of five. Actually, there’s no way that’s routine and boring.

Valum’s mom, Sarah, tells me that she didn’t know about the new vaccine but is very happy to have it because pneumonia is a dangerous illness for children. Metrine, mom of Lavandar, agrees. Some of the women I speak to know families who have lost a child to pneumonia.

Sarah and Metrine understand that without support from developed countries this vaccine would probably not be available to their babies. They both ask me to thank Americans. I ask them if there is anything they would like to say directly to the decision-makers in Washington.

Yes, they say. Please tell them again thank you, their help is very much appreciated and their support is paramount for the health of our children.

Amen.

TAGS: ONE, ONE Trip to Kenya & Tanzania 2011, pneumonia, vaccines