Vaccine Cold Chain - a critical facility enabling healthy vaccine storage for the children
UNICEF, with support from GAVI and JICA, expands and strengthens immunisation programme in hardest to reach areas of Afghanistan
Badghis, Afghanistan: “Storing vaccines until they’re used involves a lot of effort. If we did not have a cold chain management system and freezers here, we would not have any vaccines for the children of Badghis,” says Mohammad Yousuf, a cold chain technician in Badghis Provincial Hospital in Qala-e-Naw, the provincial capital. Before starting work as a cold-chain technician, Mohammad worked as community-based vaccinator for 13 years.
In hospitals and health facilities across Afghanistan – including Badghis Provincial Hospital, where Mohammad works - UNICEF is strengthening the Expanded Programme for Immunisation (EPI) as part of a global bid to close the gap on zero dose children. Support to EPI includes procuring and administering vaccines, but also storing and transporting them at the constant low temperatures needed to maintain their effectiveness to protect children against disease. Major hospitals, like Badghis, have cold storage rooms serving the vaccine needs of the whole province.
A father of nine children himself, the youngest being only four months old, Mohammad is an advocate for the importance of vaccines for children’s health. “For my community and family, I set an example by having all my children fully vaccinated,” he says. “After two years working as a technician, I have also learnt the importance of temperature maintenance for vaccines, and the equipment to support it. If the temperature goes up or down even by a degree, the entire vaccine stock could be wasted.”
With support from GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance, vaccines and various types of equipment to support cold chain and vaccine management were procured last year. The equipment included 318 solar direct drive refrigerators installed at selected health facilities in all 34 provinces countrywide, spare parts to repair non-functional equipment, and 27 manual forklifts to move items inside the warehouse. Vaccine carriers – portable insulated boxes with a cross-body strap used by mobile vaccinators – were also procured. In addition, shelves for proper storage of dry supplies and cold boxes were also installed in health facilities in 10 provinces in the West, North, Northeast and Central Regions of Afghanistan.
Equally, generous support from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has enabled UNICEF to establish 16 walk-in cold and freezer rooms 46 ice-lined refrigerators 44 deep freezers and five large solar direct drive refrigerators for national and provincial cold chain stores in the North, East and Central Regions. Under the same initiative, 13 generators were also procured. 11 of the generators were installed in selected provinces, while two are kept in storage as a backup. The generators play a critical role - they help ensure the continuous availability of electricity in order to maintain the constant temperature required for vaccine storage.
“Vaccines are sensitive to temperature. I come here to collect the stock before going into communities. Seeing them stored in a high-quality system assures me that the vaccines are in a suitable condition,”
27-year-old Gulzar has been working in Badghis provincial hospital as a vaccinator for nine years. Sharing her experience vaccinating children and women at the hospital, Gulzar says: “Vaccination for me contributes to protecting children from illnesses and viruses in the environment, and saving lives. I vaccinate up to 200 patients a day in summer.”
In 2024, over 1.6 million Afghan children under one year of age (789,000 girls and 834,000 boys) received Penta-III vaccines from UNICEF and partners, protecting them against diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough and hepatitis B. Some 2.3 million children under five years of age (1.1 million girls and 1.2 million boys) were vaccinated against measles. Thanks to JICA, the impending arrival of nine refrigerated trucks from - two large and seven small - will help maintain the cold chain as vaccines are moved from national to provincial vaccine stores for use.
While progress is being made to reach every child, Afghanistan continues to remain in constant need of a fresh supply of vaccines, and support to expand cold chain capacity to ensure their optimal and effective storage in major facilities in Kabul and the provincial capitals. Thanks to the generous support of donors like JICA and GAVI, UNICEF is able to continue its efforts to protect every child in Afghanistan from vaccine-preventable illnesses.
