Tadjikistan

Frontline Diary

28 September 2004: Day One on the immunization trail in Tajikistan

© UNICEF/ HQ04-0651/Pirozzi

10-year-old Suamn is vaccinated against measles in Dushanbe.

Tajikistan has launched a nationwide measles campaign to protect almost 3 million children and young people against a disease that is a major child-killer in the developing world. Almost 50 per cent of the country's total population will be immunized over the next two weeks. UNICEF's Lynn Geldof is an international observer for social mobilization issues and is travelling with one of the immunization teams.  In this Frontline Diary entry she gives her personal view of the immunization campaign.

DUSHANBE, TAJIKISTAN, 28 September 2004 - I knew that 93 per cent of the country was mountainous, which is the main challenge to the immunization campaign here, but I still didn't expect to come smack up against the mountains so quickly.

We're heading for Varzob District and a rivulet we noticed earlier suddenly becomes a torrent. Yet we can't be more than 15 to 20 km outside the capital Dushanbe.? I look up: The Varzob River has cut a gorge through the mountains. Noisy, blue, sparkling, it rushes past in the opposite direction going about its own important business of supplying 50 per cent of the capital with its generous flow and powering a hydroelectric plant in the process.

Once in Varzob, the UNICEF team hops out of the car and a boy and a girl appear. They are dressed in bright red with matching cheeks. Radjavova Lola is 11 and she was immunized yesterday - campaign launch day. Husseinov Husseini is nine and it will be his turn today. Sure they knew about measles. They had learned all about it in a special lesson at school. "No, it didn't hurt. Not much, anyway," says Radjavova.

Sitting in the hot seat at the Varzob District Ambulatory Family Medical Care Centre is Guryesova Mijgona, 12. The arrival of the team delays the fateful moment. She takes in the preparations for administering the vaccine, looks confidently around her, presents her skinny upper arm for the health worker, holds our gaze and then ducks out the door to sit in the corridor beside a line of silent, if thankful, post-vaccination kids, some parents and the local Mullah, Saido Raupov.

Coming in the door are some sceptical candidates of between one and three years old. Their antennae have picked up the vibes and they are less than convinced. A wail from inside the vaccination room does not help matters but then they see the owner of the wail emerging upright, dry-eyed. They struggle to interpret these strange contradictory messages.

The Mullah is pleased. As a key influential figure in Varzob, he has been part of the effort to mobilize the community. After two hours, they have immunized 70 children and by close of day they aim to have done 170. "We Mullahs know of the importance of immunization because we were used to it from Soviet times," Mullah Raupov explains, "but now, for the first time, we know what the symptoms and possible consequences of measles are. I have not only been preaching about immunization during Friday prayers, but every day. And I have been visiting parents in their homes as well to explain it to them."

Higher up in the mountains is the village of Chorbog, the largest of Varzob District, with some 11,140 inhabitants, of whom 5,014 are targeted for measles immunization. Here the main mobile post is at the school. As before, the non-school-age children are seriously spruced up for the occasion - bows and frills for the girls, and often suits for the boys.

Flasks of boiling water, sugar and a china tea-set are lined up at the back of the classroom-turned-immunization post for those inclined to swoon or feel queasy at the mere sight of a needle. I acknowledge, shamelessly, that I would fit well with that company.

English teacher Najmidina Vali says it's the first time the school has been used for such an occasion. "And every teacher, not just me, has given special classes on the importance of measles immunization," he says, smiling. "Just yesterday, they immunized 935 children." The success is felt personally.