India refutes Lancet report, says unvaccinated child rate now lower

A recent Lancet report had grouped India among eight countries having more than half of the world's zero dose children as of 2023

Amid recent reports flagging India as a country with a high burden of unvaccinated children, the Centre has said that the percentage of zero dose children to the total population in the country has declined from 0.11 per cent in 2023 to 0.06 per cent in 2024.

 

For operational purposes, international agencies categorise zero dose children as infants who have not received the first dose of the DTP (diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis) vaccine.  

 

According to a recent Lancet report, 15.7 million children had not received any doses of the DTP vaccine in their first year globally in 2023. Of these, India had the second highest burden of zero dose children at 1.44 million after Nigeria.

 

The report also clubbed India among eight countries which accounted for more than half of the world’s unvaccinated children population. These countries include Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan, Indonesia, and Brazil.

 

Responding to the report, the Union Health Ministry on Saturday said that any comparison of India with countries that have a high burden of zero dose children needs to take its large population size and high vaccination coverage under the Universal Immunisation Programme (UIP) into consideration. 

 

The ministry claims to provide free vaccination services annually to 29 million pregnant women and 26 million infants aged zero to one year under the UIP.

 

The ministry added that the Centre, in consultation with all states and union territories (UTs), has launched targeted campaigns to address challenges among zero dose children.

 

This includes the roll out of a zero dose implementation plan across 143 districts in eleven states with a high burden of unvaccinated children.

 

“These campaigns particularly target regions such as urban slums, peri-urban areas, migratory populations, hard-to-reach regions, and communities affected by vaccine hesitancy,” it said. 

 

The health ministry also claimed that India’s antigen-wise immunisation coverage is already surpassing global averages across all antigens.

 

Citing the WHO and UNICEF Estimates of National Immunisation Coverage (WUENIC) report for 2023, the ministry stated that India’s national DTP-1 coverage stood at 93 per cent, with 24.7 million out of 26.5 million infants having been covered.

 

This is higher than Nigeria’s 70 per cent coverage during the equivalent period.

 

It added that there has been a decrease in dropout percentage from DTP-1 to DTP-3 from 7 per cent in 2013 to 2 per cent in 2023, and an increase in coverage of measles from 83 per cent in 2013 to 93 per cent in 2023.

 

“Therefore, any interpretation or analysis based on isolated factors does not lend credence to the country’s progress on its immunisation programme,” the ministry said.