Anti Vaccine - A Global Epidemic?

The Dengue Vaccine was introduced in the Philippines about 3 years ago and starting at age 9, individuals were eligible to receive this vaccine. It came in 3 doses and was mainly administered by nurses and midwives through the schools. However, in early 2017, there was some reports by a governmental department that this vaccine actually leads to death. Some pro-vaccine advocates claim that this was a political muse that was meant to distract the population from other issues that were pertinent to the ongoing elections. As a result of this news, many began to doubt the vaccine’s efficacy and actually refused to comply. Thus it became a struggle for health care professionals to convince patients to receive this vaccine. It does appear that they tried to incentive patients to receive this vaccine by creating a “fast pass” system in which those who had received the dengue vaccine would be able to be seen by the doctor much faster than others. Similarly, those who had received the dengue vaccine were eligible to receive some financial or monetary support in the event that they were ever hospitalized. Currently, the dengue vaccine along with the anti-rabies vaccine (both of which are produced by the same company) are not being produced. 

Though I have only been here a few days, one thing I have seen is the severe shortage in staff.  The RHU serves the municipality of Quezon, which is approximately 16,000 and it is only staffed by 1 doctor and 12 nurses. There are some programs in place to help bring doctors and nurses to these areas, but most rely on funding from government and is therefore not a permanent solution. This leads me to ask the very important question - how can we make sure that people living in these areas have access to timely and quality health care? 

Alabat Hospital

In the afternoon, we were also able to visit the main hospital, Alabat Hospital, which is located about 45 minutes away. Though it is equipped with a surgical suite, there is no surgeon so it lies vacant majority of the time. To me, this was a saddening site because it showed that if there had been a trained surgeon on the island, that doctor would have had the necessary resources to treat these patients that needed surgical intervention. Instead, those patients would now have to travel to the mainland and receive care, which can be a very costly expenditure.