Cluster survey evaluation of a measles vaccination campaign in Jharkhand India 2012.

Thursday, 5th of May 2016

PLoS One. 2015 May 26;10(5):e0127105. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0127105. eCollection 2015.

Cluster survey evaluation of a measles vaccination campaign in Jharkhand India 2012.

Scobie HM¹ Ray A² Routray S² Bose A² Bahl S² Sosler S² Wannemuehler K³ Kumar R⁴ Haldar P⁴Anand A³.

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Abstract

INTRODUCTION:

India was the last country in the world to implement a two-dose strategy for measles-containing vaccine (MCV) in 2010. As part of measles second-dose introduction phased measles vaccination campaigns were conducted during 2010-2013 targeting 131 million children 9 months to <10 years of age. We performed a post-campaign coverage survey to estimate measles vaccination coverage in Jharkhand state.

METHODS:

A multi-stage cluster survey was conducted 2 months after the phase 2 measles campaign occurred in 19 of 24 districts of Jharkhand during November 2011-March 2012. Vaccination status of children 9 months to <10 years of age was documented based on vaccination card or mothers recall. Coverage estimates and 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) for 1018 children were calculated using survey methods.

RESULTS:

In the Jharkhand phase 2 campaign MCV coverage among children aged 9 months to <10 years was 61.0% (95% CI: 54.4-67.7%). Significant differences in coverage were observed between rural (65.0%; 95% CI: 56.8-73.2%) and urban areas (45.6%; 95% CI: 37.3-53.9%). Campaign awareness among mothers was low (51.5%) omega replicas de relojes and the most commonly reported reason for non-vaccination was being unaware of the campaign (69.4%). At the end of the campaign 53.7% (95% CI: 46.5-60.9%) of children 12 months to <10 years of age received ≥ 2 MCV doses while a large proportion of children remained under-vaccinated (34.0% 95% CI: 28.0-40.0%) or unvaccinated (12.3% 95% CI: 9.3-16.2%).

CONCLUSIONS:

Implementation of the national measles campaign was a significant achievement towards measles elimination in India. In Jharkhand campaign performance was below the target coverage of ≥ 90% set by the Government of India and challenges in disseminating campaign messages were identified. Efforts towards increasing two-dose MCV coverage are needed to achieve the recently adopted measles elimination goal in India and the South-East Asia region.