DOI: 10.36347/sjams.2020.v08i01.026

Pages: 133-138

Vaccination has saved more lives worldwide than any other medical products or procedures. To accelerate immunization coverage, Mission Indradhanush was launched by Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in 2014. Under Mission Indradhanush, the immunization programme was strengthened and also newer vaccines like pentavalent, rotavirus and f-IPV vaccines were sequentially introduced. Mission Indradhanush was intensified in 2017 to further accelerate full immunization coverage. The present study was done for a period of 2 months in 2 urban areas, 2 rural areas and 2 tribal areas of East Godavari district of Andhra Pradesh with the objective to know the immunization coverage in children aged 1-2 years after launching Mission Indradhanush with the aim to evaluate the primary immunization coverage, coverage of newer vaccines after launching MI , assess the knowledge of mothers on routine vaccination with a special focus on newer vaccines and the reasons for delay or dropouts in vaccination. In the present study, the overall coverage of primary immunization was 94.8%. Overall immunization coverage is less in urban areas compared to rural and tribal areas. Literacy of mother, parity and place of delivery had significant association with complete immunization coverage. The main reason for high dropout rate of newer vaccines was nonavailability of vaccine. This study showed that Mission Indradhanush was successful in accelerating the overall primary immunization coverage in this area to a significant extent.