By Lemuella Tarawallie
UNICEF and Africa Centre for Disease Control (CDC) last Friday handed over 570 motorbikes, 53 cold chain equipment, 300 boxes of vaccine carriers, and two spare parts for each equipment to the Ministry of Health and Sanitation.
The aim of the UNICEF and Africa CDC’s donations to the Ministry of Health and Sanitation is to ensure that more people can be reached with essential vaccines including COVID-19.
During the symbolic handing over ceremony at the Youyi Building Car Park, Brookfields in Freetown, the Programme Manager for the Child Health and Expanded Programme on Immunization (CH-EPI) in the Ministry of Health and Sanitation, Dr Desmond Maada Kangbai in his opening remarks, said UNICEF together with Africa CDC did a micro planning and they determined that they needed to give the Ministry a helping hand.
Dr Kangbai disclosed that UNICEF, through the support of Africa CDC, procured 570 bikes, 300 vaccine carriers and two spare parts for each equipment they had bought. He added that Africa CDC had procured for the Ministry of Health and Sanitation 31 cold chain equipment and that 22 were procured for the Population Service International (PSI), which brought it to the total number of 53 cold chains.
The National Coordinator for Africa CDC, Dr Clement Daam, stated that at Africa CDC it was their joy to see that Africa was taking this direction and that “Africa CDC is supported by the Europeans to provide support to Africa to identify gaps through live-saving programmes”.
Dr Clement Daam added that handing over the cold chain equipment, motorbikes, vaccine carriers, and spare parts was a life-line achievement. He noted that the delivery of the donated items was one area where Africa CDC was supporting and saving lives in many parts of Africa.
The UNICEF Country Representative, Rudolf Schwenk, said they were handing over the donated items to the Ministry of Health and Sanitation so that more people could be reached with essential vaccines including COVID-19. He added that the motorbikes would be used to strengthen the outreach service, last-mile vaccine distribution and supportive supervision at the lowest level.
“UNICEF has handed over 17 set of cold chain equipment that will be used by central and district cold chain technicians for installations and repairs”, the UNICEF Country representative said.
He said UNICEF was proud to have worked closely with the Ministry of Health and Sanitation during all stages of this project and that UNICEF was looking forward to continue with the current joint efforts to integrate COVID-19 vaccines into immunization services including hard-to-reach communities.
Rudolf Schwenk noted that he hoped that these motorbikes and tool kits for the cold chain equipment would contribute significantly to the ongoing fight towards maternal and child mortality reduction in Sierra Leone.
The Deputy Minister of Health 1, Dr Charles Senesie, said the handing over of the motorbikes would enhance mobility and that cold chain and all its accessories were welcoming gestures.
He added that these were well needed items that would actually improve the quality of children’s lives in making sure that the vaccines were delivered on time and the cold chain maintained.
Dr Charles Senesie noted that they at the Ministry of Health and Sanitation were sure that the equipment would help to mitigate the challenges the health sector was faced with and create the enabling environment for health care workers to be able to deliver the vaccines to children who were in need of them.