Assessing the impact of COVID-19 on routine immunization in Sierra Leone.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The COVID-19 pandemic had a profound impact on healthcare systems and services, including routine immunization (RI). To date, there is limited information on the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on RI in West African countries such as Sierra Leone, which had already experienced public health emergencies that disrupted its healthcare system. Here, we describe the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the RI of key antigens in Sierra Leone.

Methods

We used vaccination data from the District Health Information System for BCG, measles-rubella 1 and 2, and pentavalent 1 and 3 antigens. We compared 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022 annual coverage rates for the selected antigens at the national and district levels. We used the Pearson chi-square test to assess the difference betw

SUBMITTER: Sesay U 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11225177 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature