Why N. Eastern counties lags in Covid vaccination drive

Religious leaders want the government to use places of worship to reach people in the North Eastern region of the country with Covid-19 vaccines.

Sheikh Yusuf Abu Hamza, a director at the Supreme Council of Kenyan Muslims now says the low uptake of vaccines in the region has been occasioned by the distance people have to cover reach to the vaccination posts. He said most are stationed far away.

The region has been lagging behind in the vaccination drive despite other counties such as Nyeri and Nairobi having fully vaccinated at least half of their target population.

“The vaccination posts are far from the people especially in the North Eastern I have been in Garissa and Wajir and the vaccination centres are far from the people,” he said.

“Majority of people are yet to be vaccinated because they don’t have access. The government should use our places of worship; we have mosques, churches and schools to reach people.”

Data from the Ministry of Health shows that as at October 16, Mandera had fully vaccinated 35,654 out of the targeted 341,857 people which represents just 10.4 per cent coverage.

Tana River had vaccinated 16,707 of the targeted 151,051 (11.1 per cent), Wajir 37, 445 of the targeted 337,296 (11.1), Marsabit 24,777 of the targeted 219,170(11.3 per cent), Isiolo 17,641 of the targeted 133,358 (13.2 per cent) while Garissa had managed to fully vaccinate 55,557 of the targeted 399,358 (13.9 per cent).

In terms of issuance of booster shots, the counties have also continued to perform poorly, 10 months since the booster programme was launched in January this year.

For instance, Wajir has administered 161 shots, Mandera 312, Isiolo 328, Tana River 373 and Garissa 412 compared to 274,994 for Nairobi, 87,483 for Nakuru and 74,160 for Meru.

The cleric has further faulted the government for slowing down on giving information about the disease as was the case earlier, making it difficult for clerics to relay any meaningful information to their congregants.

“When Covid came we saw daily updates but after getting a vaccine and people getting vaccinated there is no news and it has been hard for us religious leaders to educate and create awareness because of the scarcity of information we also get,” he said.

According to the programmes manager at Christian aid Abdul Agukoh, politics has also played a key role in slowing down the vaccination drive as attention was diverted to the campaigns by the government and other agencies.

General uptake data shows 22.2 million vaccines have been administered across the country; 18.1 million to the population aged 18 years and above and another 2.6 million to those aged between 12 years and 18 years.

The proportion of adults fully vaccinated now stands at 35.8 per cent.

“The treat of Covid-19 is still there. There was political campaign that took a lot of interest from us as a government and agencies but now since politics is done and dusted we need to ensure we protect the various populations in the country,” he said.

Christian Aid has launched a vaccine campaign that seeks to contribute to increased supply, access and uptake of Covid-19 safe, effective and affordable vaccines by the target population in Kenya.