Measles Rubella: Oyo targets over 3m children for vaccination

By Oluseye Ojo

The Oyo State Government has announced vaccination for over three million children in its Integrated Measles Rubella Campaign.

Rubella, also known as German measles, typically causes mild illness in children and adults. It is said to be the leasing cause of death among young children worldwide. As gathered, it is under-documented due to limited surveillance.

Executive Secretary, Oyo State Primary Health Care Board, Dr. Muideen Olatunji, made the disclosure on Monday during a media engagement, held in Ibadan.

He stated that the campaign would hold from October 4th to 14th, 2025. He added that October 15th and 16th have also been set aside for mop-up exercise for the campaign.

Olatunji made it known that in the rollout, the target age group is between nine months and 14 years.

“By the population of the state, we are hoping to reach as much as about 3 million plus. Specifically, 3,694,610 eligible target groups are the ones we are targeting to focus on.

“Most of these will be in the communities, and some of them will be in-l school groups that want to ensure that we vaccinate.

“After this campaign, we hope and we believe that people will be well accustomed to and can join in the organisation of this intervention.”

Olatunji added: “Rubella has about the same pathophysiology with measles. They are like twin sisters. The best thing, which we think is cheaper, is to prevent it from occurring, and any life lost, we cannot buy such a life back. So, it’s better for us to be sure to prevent it from occurring.

“Now, what are we doing with this rollout? We are going to be focussing on children between the age of 9 months to 14 years. 14 years is to be able to do a sort of a catch-up on those that might have missed the period of vaccination.

“In this programme rollout, we are going to have a house-to-house campaign. We are going to use fixed posts and mobile fixed posts. We hope to ensure that we reach as many as possible.

“Right now, we don’t need to convince anybody that vaccine does not kill. At least, we’ve seen it from several experiences we’ve had in the past.”