Parents bring kids to clinics for vaccination

More than 200 children, accompanied by their parents, trooped to public and private health centers Commonwealth-wide over the weekend, following the announcement by the Department of Public Health of a measles alert.

The public health department issued the alert to prevent a similar outbreak of the disease that happened on Guam.

Public Health secretary Dr. James U. Hofschneider said more than 200 children were immunized over the weekend.

As this developed, Hofschneider said the DPH extended the servicing hours of the Commonwealth Health Center’s children’s clinic to accommodate more children for vaccination.

“In order to serve the needs of the community, the CHC Children’s Clinic will be open for an additional two hours for immunization this week, April 30 to May 3, from 5pm to 7pm,” he said.

“Please take advantage of this opportunity to have your child immunized. Immunization will benefit the health of your child as well as the health of the whole community,” the secretary urged.

Hofschneider stressed, though, that there has been no reported case of measles in the CNMI since 1995. But he urged parents to check the immunization records of their children, and see if they need to have their kids immunized.

There are two groups of children who may need to be vaccinated, according to the DPH. The first group are those children who are “one year of age or older who never received the MMR [measles, mumps and rubella] vaccine; second are those children four years of age or over who only have one MMR shot.”

Measles is a communicable viral disease, the symptoms of which include high fever, red rash which covers the body, runny nose, watery eyes and coughing.

Since a widespread of the disease may be fatal to many, there is an international attention geared towards measles prevention. In Africa alone, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cited that there is an estimated 12 million cases of measles a year, and 450,000 deaths result from them.

“The DPH is continuing measures to prevent an outbreak of measles here in the CNMI due to the recent cases of measles in Guam. The DPH reassures the public that there are no reported cases of measles so far in the CNMI,” Hofschneider said.

He advised parents to coordinate with their children’s doctor within the week if the kids need to be given MMR doses. These are available at the CHC, the Tinian Health Center, Rota health Center and all the private clinics, he said.