Seen and heard on Ms. Theary C. Seng's Facebook accounts:
www.facebook.com/theary.c.seng
www.facebook.com/theary.c.seng
Theary C. Seng: I just had THE MOST DISTURBING conversation with 2 mothers here in
Kep. They are worried sick, along with other parents, their disturbance
triggered by this shocking, unusual nightmare that occurred in one
Battambang village.
They told me that one strand of the lively
and agitated conversation in the market this morning concerned the
doctor, that he is a tool of politicians higher up and INTENTIONALLY
used the infected needles to transmit the HIV. How could it not be intentional with 80 infections and the number rising?!
Is this possible, they asked me.
Without waiting for me to answer they both began to tell me of what
happened here in Kep 6 or 7 months ago when their children were given
shots in school (grades 1-6) without their prior knowledge, one of them
were beaten by the teacher for refusing. They said when they found out a
few days later they asked their employer if she has heard of other
cases in Phnom Penh or other provinces.
I told them no teacher
or authority can give their children shots without their prior knowledge
and consent; they said there may have been a banner here or there
telling of the shots to be administered.
I said it doesn't
matter if no or few parents heard about it; the parents/guardians need
to be given proper information and to give their consent.
They
then told me an even more extraordinary thing: along with the
"preventive shot", each student was forced to dip his/her finger in
indelible ink, similar to the one administered during the elections.
Incredulous, I asked them when this occurred recently, this year? Yes,
around April this year. The talk among the people on social media a
week later, they said, is that it is a plan to kill off the next
generation of voters in order to make way for new people. Prior years,
shots may have been administered but never accompanied with dipping the
finger into indelible ink that lasted a couple of days.
They
said this morning at the market the talk is that now 400 villagers are
infected in Takeo. Have I heard? (I have not, even after a quick
peruse of the news just now. Though the doctor was reported by this
Post report to have fled to Takeo a week ago.)
Phnom Penh Post HIV nightmare in Battambang:
More than 70 residents in Battambang’s Sangke district – including
children as young as 3 – have tested positive for HIV after some of them
received injections from an unlicensed doctor now on the run from
authorities.]
Rasoka Thor: A
story like in Battambang creates a lot of fears and confusion among the
population. Your report about Kep may be a good example of this. While
in Battambang it is a private practice of an unlicenced practitioner
(and God knows, how problematic and dangerous
are practices in the private sector in Cambodia), the shots given to
school children was probably an immunization campaign against measles
organized by the Ministry of Health with technical and financial support
from international health partner such as WHO, UNICEF, USAID, JICA etc.
All vaccines and injection material used during those official
campaigns are sterile and the health staff have been trained. These
vaccinations are very important to protect not only individuals but the
whole community (to prevent or stop an outbreak than could kill or leave
dozen of children with permanent disabilities). Therefore the public
health services have the authority to immunize ALL children (except
cases with medical counter indication). It is not up to the good willing
of parents because the more children are not immunized the more the
society is put in danger. It is a matter of civic duty! And we don't
want Cambodia to become like Nigeria or Pakistan, where people refuse to
vaccinate their children and undermine the whole global polio
eradication effort, do we?
Rasoka Thor: When
there is a mass immunization campaign like for polio eradication or
measles outbreak, vaccination teams have to vaccinate all children of a
target age (for instance all children under five years) in a district in
one day or two days. The best way not
to miss children or not to vaccinate the same child twice is to dip
finger in indelible ink (this method is used for mass immunization
everywhere in the world). Regarding parents' consent, usually parents
bring their children to the vaccination post or when the health staff go
house to house the parents or child care givers are present, never a
child is immunized without the agreement of the parents or care givers
(it is all verbally, there is no written document because it would be
too much work load that cannot be managed in a mass campaign. A team of
3-4 staff who have to give injection to several hundred children in one
day, has just the time to put a cross on a tally sheet to keep record of
number of children reached...). The case of school children in Kep is a
bit different as children were at school when the vaccination took
place, and the parents are not present. However the mothers said that
there were banners for public information, some people paid attention to
them, but the majority of people probably not... Because of the
managerial constraints, it is not possible to send a letter to each
family to sign. And as I said in my first message, because the public
health interest is at stake, the vaccination campaign must be a bit
coercive because the vaccination coverage has to be more than 90%, if
less the whole campaign may not have the effect to stop the outbreak of
measles or to eradicate the polio. All efforts and hundred of thousands
dollars could have been wasted. And I forgot to say that the
immunization campaigns always use disposable needles (usually provided
by international assistance) which prevent chain contamination. It would
be a pity that the misconduct of some individuals in their private
practice (like the case in Battambang) makes the people fear and reject
public health interventions. At the end of the day, it is still the
children who suffer the consequences for not receiving adequate
services.
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