Shafaqna English- Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation, has reported previous outbreaks of measles, mostly driven by gaps in vaccination coverage after concerns over the Halal status of measles vaccines.
Three health care workers rode motorbikes into the Indonesian city of Sumenep, carrying doses of measles vaccine and a list of children who needed them. With blue medical boxes in hand, they went from house to house administering the life-saving shots.
The health workers on wheels are part of the regional government’s latest efforts to curb a deadly measles outbreak on Madura Island that has persisted for the past nine months. More than 2,600 children have already been infected this year, and 20 have died.
But efforts to stop the outbreak from spreading through the predominantly Muslim population are being hindered in part by concerns that some measles vaccines may not meet Islamic Halal standards because they use a stabilizer that is derived from pigs.
Sources: Associated Press