Friday 19 of April 2013, a press conference on the African Vaccination Week was held at the library of WHO, Yaoundé, Cameroun.

The press conference was organized to announce the third African Vaccination Week, which will be celebrated jointly with the Maternal and Child Nutrition Action Week (MCNAW) from 26 until 30  April in all ten regions of Cameroun.

The main goal of the press conference was to involve key media outlets of the country in the promotion of the health benefits of vaccination. This goal was attained successfully, since 33 journalists of the written, online and audio visual media were present.

Participants included representatives of the Ministry of health (Directors of family health, health promotion, and EPI manager), partners and ONG’s involved in vaccination activities in Cameroon (UNICEF, Rotary International, Lions Club, and PLAN Cameroun).

In her welcoming speech, de WHO representative for Cameroun, Doctor Charlotte Faty Ndiaye, emphasized that Cameroun has made commendable progress in saving the lives of children from measles, polio and other vaccine-preventable diseases. Doctor Faty Ndiaye congratulated the government of Cameroun for the introduction of the new vaccines into expanded vaccination programme that now protects against 10 diseases. However she deplored the fact that “although immunization is the most successful and cost effective health intervention, the vaccination services are still not used effectively by communities. A great number of vaccine-preventable diseases, illnesses and deaths are still common in Cameroun because children and women were not fully vaccinated or missed during vaccination, due to ignorance or because of wrongful information”.

There is a need to better communicate the health benefits of vaccination and the dangers of not immunizing children”. This is why the media where invited to really support the promotion of vaccinations.

The questions and answer session at the end of the briefing was moderated by the Dr Saa, who expanded the knowledge to the journalists on the current vaccination situation in Cameroun, the AVW and the activities planned in the AVW 2013. 

At the end of the session, the journalists had the opportunity to visit the offices of the Expanded Programme on Vaccination as well as the vaccination warehouse.