Vanuatu youth roll up their sleeves for COVID-19 vaccines

Above: Vaccinator Serah Mala gives 14-year-old Precilla a COVID-19 vaccination in Port Narvin on Erromango Island, Vanuatu as part of Tafea Health vaccination rollout, supported by CARE Vanuatu through the Australian Humanitarian Partnership. Photo: Rose Topal/CARE Vanuatu

Young people in the remote southern islands of Vanuatu are helping to protect themselves and vulnerable members of their families and communities against COVID-19, thanks to vaccines being rolled out across Tafea Province.

Reaching the far-flung, sparsely populated communities of Vanuatu’s 83 islands with vaccines is a huge logistical challenge. Strong vaccine hesitancy in some communities, fed by online misinformation, adds another layer of challenges.

But vaccination – not only for COVID-19, but also for childhood diseases – is critical, because health services are also limited in many areas, and the Pacific nation’s reliance on tourism makes it highly vulnerable to disease outbreaks.

Like most countries, Vanuatu first prioritised vaccinating frontline workers and vulnerable people against COVID-19, beginning its vaccination campaign in June 2021. By May 2022, 91% of ni-Vanuatu adults had received a vaccine. Now, through the Australian Humanitarian Partnership, CARE Vanuatu is working with Vanuatu’s Ministry of Health and Tafea Health to enable schoolchildren aged 10 and over to be vaccinated against COVID-19, and other diseases too.

COVID-19 vaccinations are being offered to children at schools, health facilities and pop-up, outdoor community clinics, and adults are also able to get boosters at the clinics. CARE staff are travelling with health workers as part of the vaccination team, supporting logistics as well as assisting on answering the questions of community leaders, parents, caregivers and the children themselves, capturing caregivers’ consent for their children to be vaccinated, and ensuring that all children – both girls and boys of all abilities – have information and opportunity to be vaccinated.

To make the most of the logistics in place to transport the COVID-19 vaccines, the CARE team has also supported the Ministry of Health to transport measles vaccines to remote communities, where local health nurses will roll them out through the regular childhood vaccination schedule.

School principals and teachers, community leaders and local health workers throughout the province are critical partners in the children’s COVID-19 vaccination campaign, sharing information about the vaccine and gathering parents’ consent ahead of the visiting vaccination team’s arrival in their community.

Charles and Susan Nambill from Port Narvin community on Erromango decided to vaccinate themselves and their children after receiving information about the COVID-19 vaccine from their trusted local health worker.

"I made a choice to get the jab together with my husband to protect my family, despite all the negative rumours about vaccine. When we made the decision to let our children get their first dose, we had questions in our minds, wondering we had made the right choice. But we have listened to the awareness information from our health worker, who visited to explain it to us a few months ago,” says Susan.

14-year-old Precilla Naitanto is one of the students in Ipota on Erromango who has been vaccinated against COVID-19 this month.

“I was afraid of the COVID-19 vaccine after hearing so much information from my friends at school. But my parents talked to me and my other siblings about the vaccine, explaining that it was safe and that it was going to protect us from COVID-19. I thank the nurse in charge today for the awareness that cleared off a few other confusions I had before I finally made the choice to be vaccinated. As a young girl, I appeal to the others who have not yet taken their jabs to trust that this vaccine is safe and it save lives. Go and get your vaccine because I have already taken mine,” she says.

These activities are supported by the Australian Government and implemented through the Australian Humanitarian Partnership, as part of the Vanuatu COVID-19 humanitarian response.