Ministerial Meeting Focuses on Effective Immunization Coverage in South-East Asia

Reaching high-risk communities and those in hard-to-reach areas is one of the challenges to routine immunization in South-East Asia.

At a two-day high-level ministerial meeting of South East Asia region recently in Delhi. the health ministers and experts from 11 member States of the region have decided to step up efforts to increase and sustain immunization coverage in the region.

The ministers from Bangladesh, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Myanmar and Nepal attended the conference. The WHO has declared 2012 as the Year of Intensification for Routine Immunization in the South East Asia Region.

Recognized as one of the most cost-effective and powerful public health interventions, immunization is critical to achieving Millennium Development Goal 4 (MDG 4): a reduction of deaths of children under the age of five. Despite the achievements in routine immunization in the region, the coverage is not uniform between co