Doctors Urge Action on Immunisation
The immunisation of New Zealand children is too important to
be used as a
pre-Election political football, the New
Zealand Medical Association says.
"Politicians should stop
arguing about whether a National Health Committee
report
on immunisation had been suppressed or not" said NZMA
Chairman Dr
Pippa MacKay. "Instead, politicians should
acknowledge that immunisation
rates are declining because
not enough has been done, particularly to ensure
that
hard-to-reach children are immunised, and rise to the
challenge to take
urgent action."
"Immunisation is
critically important to the health of New Zealand
children.
We are totally off-track to meet the Ministry
of Health's Immunisation 2000
target of 95 percent
coverage."
"The NZMA strongly believes that the general
practice team should be at the
heart of plans to improve
immunisation rates," she said.
A recent study in the New
Zealand Medical Journal showed that a child who
had a
six-week check by a GP was significantly more likely to be
immunised
that a child who had a six-week check from any
other health provider.
Immunisation of children is free,
under the Well Child and Under-Sixes
programmes.
Dr
MacKay said innovative approaches were needed, particularly
to reach
children from lower-socio economic families, who
were often highly mobile.
"As many as half the children
admitted to Middlemore Hospital last winter
suffering
from preventable illnesses did not have a GP," Dr MacKay
said. "It
is vital to ensure that these children access
the general practice team."
Immunisation levels in New
Zealand are seriously low compared to many
overseas
countries. The NZMA shares the World Health Organisation's
serious
concerns that New Zealand's immunisation rate is
holding back attempts to
eradicate measles world-wide,
and that the potentially fatal disease is
being exported
to other countries.
In contrast, a recent issue of the
British Medical Journal reported that
measles has been
eradicated in the USA as an indigenous
disease.
ends