MANILA, Philippines—While all eyes are fixed on the COVID-19 pandemic, barely any attention is being given to what could be an equally devastating health crisis—the decline in child immunization against killer but preventable diseases.
The United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (Unicef) in 2019 said because of the “alarming” drop in inoculation rates against “deadly, but preventable diseases,” some 2.9 million children in the Philippines had been put at risk.
In recent years, child immunization coverage has been “sharply declining” from 87 percent in 2014 to 68 percent in 2019, exposing children to diseases like measles, polio, DTP (diphtheria, tetanus and p…
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