WORLD Immunisation Week whose theme is ‘Vaccines Work’ celebrated in the last week of April aimed to promote the use of vaccines to protect people of all ages against disease. Immunisation saves millions of lives and is widely recognised as one of the world’s most successful and cost-effective health interventions. Today, there are still 19.4 million unvaccinated and under-vaccinated children in the world.
2017 marks the halfway point in the Global Vaccine Action Plan (GVAP) – endorsed by 194 member states of the World Health Assembly in May 2012 – which aims to prevent millions of deaths from vaccine-preventable diseases by 2020 through universal access to immunisation.
Despite improvements in individual countries and a strong global rate of new vaccine introduction, all of the targets for disease elimination—including measles, rubella, and maternal and neonatal tetanus are behind schedule.
In order for everyone, everywhere to survive and thrive, countries must make more concerted efforts to reach GVAP goals by 2020. Additionally, those countries that have achieved or made forward progress towards achieving the goals must work to sustain those efforts over time. The main goal of the campaign is to raise awareness about the critical importance of full immunisation throughout life, and its role in achieving the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals.
As part of the 2017 campaign, WHO and partners aim to: First, highlight the importance of immunisation as a top global health investment priority. Second; Promote understanding of the action steps required to achieve the Global Vaccine Action Plan. Third; to showcase immunisation’s role in sustainable development and global health security.
Expanding access to immunisation is crucial to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Routine immunisation is a building block of strong primary health care and universal health coverage it provides a point of contact for health care at the beginning of life and offers every child the chance at a healthy life from the start.
Immunisation is also a fundamental strategy in achieving other health priorities, from controlling viral hepatitis, to curbing antimicrobial resistance, to providing a platform for adolescent health and improving antenatal and newborn care.
In the same vein, the International AIDS Candlelight Memorial, coordinated by the Global Network of People living with HIV is one of the world’s oldest and largest grassroots mobilisation campaigns for HIV awareness in the world. Started in 1983, the International AIDS Candlelight Memorial takes place every third Sunday in May and is led by a coalition of some 1 200 community organisations in 115 countries.
The International AIDS Candlelight Memorial is much more than just a memorial. The International AIDS Candlelight Memorial serves as a community mobilisation campaign to raise social consciousness about HIV and AIDS. With 33 million people living with HIV today, the International AIDS Candlelight Memorial serves as an important intervention for global solidarity, breaking down barriers of stigma and discrimination, and giving hope to new generations. It has been well established that poverty significantly influences the spread and impact of HIV/AIDS. In many ways it creates vulnerability to HIV infection, causes rapid progression of the infection in the individual due to malnutrition and limits access to social and health care services. Poverty causes impoverishment as it leads to death of the economically active segments of the society and bread winners leading to reduction in income or production.
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