A Non – Governmental Organization, Save the Children International, SCI, wants the Lagos State Government to incorporate the VaxSocial initiative into the existing state immunization strategies to maintain the momentum of vaccine acceptability and sustain the coverage in Nigeria.
The Programme Manager, SCI, VaxSocial, Dr. Felicia Meriga, made the call during a chat to acquaint journalists of the Close – Out of the organization having worked for Eighteen months in twenty – Two Local Government Areas in Lagos State on VaxSocial.
Meriga also wants Lagos State to strengthen motivation for health workers as they are vital in vaccine delivery.
According to her, “we all know that pilots like VaxSocial succeed only when their lessons are taken forward, hence the need for the key asks from the government and stakeholders as looking at the way forward.”
To be honest, when we started this pilot in Lagos State, we knew we were attempting something quite bold, explaining that, the VaxSocial (Nigeria Vaccination Coverage Project) is a digital-first immunization initiative designed to reduce hesitancy, boost confidence, and make vaccination more convenient for families”.
She explained further, “Our focus has been caregivers of children under 5, and adolescents between 9 and 14 years old who need the HPV vaccine.
The two groups Meriga noted, carry some of the highest stakes in the immunization landscape sponsored by Gavi and championed by Nivi Inc, working closely with Save the Children.
The heart of the initiative is askNivi, a WhatsApp-based digital health assistant that has quietly become a helpful companion to thousands of caregivers which gives people clear, simple, trustworthy information about vaccines and connects them to vaccination points nearby.
“Many caregivers have told us that the chatbot felt like having a calm health worker in their pocket.”
And I think that is exactly the kind of innovation our immunization ecosystem needs”.
She supported Of course, technology alone does not change behaviour. People do. And this project brought together a rich network of individuals who played very hands-on roles.- Meriga
She expressed joy that traditional and religious leaders, market women, WHCs, among others worked together to rebuild community trust, stressing that, their voices reminded people that protecting children is a shared responsibility, not a government instruction”.
The Project Coordinator for AXE-Nibi Nigeria, Veronika Obi said, the VAG social projects, which is digital demand generation was done using three key strategies which are, awareness about vaccination, which comprises routine immunisation and HPV vaccination and activation where they get information about either routine immunisation or HPV vaccination based on their intent.”
And then action is where we give them referral”.
Geo-locations is getting consent from them, and then map them to the closest healthcare facilities using the social media campaigns and adverts that runs online, “we had over 71 million impressions”.
Impressions is how many people get to see this information, “we had over 13 million social media accounts reached, and over 100,000 people came in to chat with us on the chatbot about routine immunisation and HPV vaccination”.
We also got feedbacks.
John Oluwafemiola, the Policy, Advocacy, and Campaign Officer, with SCI, on his part enumerated some challenges to include language and myth even within the civilised group.
“The myth itself is actually a myth in Lagos, because when we get to the field, we realise that the myths about immunisation are so huge that for you to break into community in terms of educating them about immunisation becomes a big problem” noting that, the chatbot was designed with the mind that we have more English-speaking people but they rather prefer that we speak Yoruba, contrary to the belief that Lagos is a place where English is actually the lingua franca”, John stated
He stressed that people need to have a smart phone, data and Some people actually have smartphone, they don’t have data.
They have internet, they don’t have data which he explained was another level of challenge.
“There is also the issue of resistance and trust, they will insist you scan because they want to know if they can trust the platform and all that” adding that they are eager to use technology to actually help them through the journey of immunisation” he concluded.
On her part, the Monitoring Evaluation Accountability and Learning Assistant on the BAC Social Project, Magdalena Bande said, stakeholders, the Ministry of Health, the Primary Health Care Board, the health workers and the caregivers were all supportive of the project.
As SCI Close-Out on activities, the officials advocated Increased funding for HPV vaccination, especially given the growing need and the gaps in awareness, Provide practical incentives for health workers serving in hard-to-reach communities, where access challenges are highest, Recruit and onboard more doctors and frontline immunization personnel to expand reach and reduce workload pressures and ensure consistent availability of vaccines in all Primary Health Centres, because no digital innovation can compete with an empty vaccine shelf.