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STORY: LEBANON / POLIO
TRT: 1.15
SOURCE: UNICEF
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 8 NOVEMBER, 2013, BEKAA VALLEY, LEBANON
1. Wide shot, informal settlement and barren field
2. Med shot people walking among ruins
3. Close up, a little girl
4. SOUNDBITE (English), Anna-Maria Laurini, UNICEF Lebanon Representative”
"We have started today the polio campaign to vaccinate all the children under five. Together with the ministry of health we have purchase one point five million doses. The one first round has started today second round will be in a month. The vaccination is an unprecedented effort. It's going to happen in all tented settlements like this one." (voice carries under picture)
5. Wide shot, children in a crowd.
6. Med shot, Minister, Anna-Maria Laurini, UNICEF Lebanon representative and others
7. Med shot, sign for the Ministry of Public Health
8. Close up, polio vaccine dropper
9. Med shot, Minister administering a polio vaccine
10. Wide shot, clothes hanging outside and a group of kids playing
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Zeroual Azzeddine, Chief of Health & Nutrition Programmes, UNICEF Lebanon:
"In order to not miss any child during this polio campaign we are using the strategy, door-to-door, tent-to-tent, house-to-house, saturday and sunday because the parents will be at home. The response so far has been fabulous"
12. Close up, man walking with a container for the polio vaccine.
13. Close up, man filling out a form pans to small child
14. Med shot, baby in a woman’s arms
15. Close up, hand marking a home with a purple circle and check mark
16. Med shot, a couple walking hand in hand with two young children
17. Med shot, couple with two children entering a room in a clinic.
18. SOUNDBITE (English) Zeroual Azzeddine, Chief of Health & Nutrition Programmes, UNICEF Lebanon:
"We are vaccinating the Syrians at the entry point into Lebanon, at the tented settlements, at the collective shelter, at UNHCR registered centres, and we care vaccinating them at the primary health care and hospital."
19. Med shot, woman with baby in her arms while receiving the polio vaccine.
20. Wide shot, makeshift homes in the informal settlement.
21. Wide shot, UNICEF branded tent with mother and baby walk by in foreground
22. SOUNDBITE, (English), Anna-Maria Laurini, UNICEF Lebanon representative:
"This is a population that is scattered in the country in around one thousand five hundred localities. But however we are confident that together with the partners and the ministry of health we are going to reach every child in need."
23. Med shot, Anna-Maria Laurini with two small girls
24. Close up, child receiving polio vaccine.
25. Close up, child receiving polio vaccine
On the morning of 8 November, scores of Syrian refugee children at the Omariya informal settlement in east Lebanon held a joyful demonstration amongst the tents in their camp.
Accompanied by social worker from the Lebanese NGO Beyond, they held colorful placards with the word ‘polio’ in Arabic crossed out, and they chanted, “Mom, Mom, I want to get vaccinated! Dad, Dad, I want to get vaccinated!”
The launch of an unprecedented mass polio vaccination campaign at Omariya – and across Lebanon – was well and truly underway.
Over the following five days UNICEF, in collaboration with the Ministry of Public Health and local NGOs, provided 1.5 million vaccination shots to reach 750,000 children in Lebanon, regardless of nationality.
Vaccination teams visited homes, health centres and around 390 informal tented settlements where Syrian refugee families live. Vaccination stations were also set up at four official border points to ensure all children coming into the country are vaccinated.
UNICEF Lebanon Representative Annamaria Laurini visited the Omariya settlement on the day of the campaign launch. “We must act quickly to ensure that each and every child in Lebanon is vaccinated,” she said. “We stand hand in hand as UN agencies, government partners, civil society together. All it takes is two drops.”
Coinciding with the vaccination campaign, UNICEF launched a broad communication and social mobilization drive emphasizing the importance of vaccinating all children under 5. Hundreds of thousands of leaflets, posters, a radio spot and a cartoon TV spot are intended to raise awareness among parents and caregivers to safeguard the health of Lebanon’s future generations.
”Immunization is among the most successful, most equitable and most cost-effective public-health interventions, and we want to make sure not to lose one child,” Ms. Laurini said.
A few minutes away from Omariya, at the Basal collective shelter for Syrian refugees, families came out to greet the four-person vaccination team. Mothers encouraged the children to take the two drops of polio vaccine by telling them it is ‘assir’ – juice.
Hala and Rakad, the two youngest siblings in a family of 10 from Al-Raqqah in Syria, got their drops of ‘assir’ as their mother watched.
“I only know it is a disease, but all my other children are vaccinated,” she said “I am happy they are getting their vaccines.”
One of the difficulties facing the vaccination drive in Lebanon is reaching the Syrian refugee children spread out in hundreds of locations across the country.
With nearly 730,000 registered refugees from Syria – more than half of them children – Lebanon faces a major challenge in maintaining its polio-free status.
The second round of the vaccination campaign will start on 6 December.
