Health team returns after helping in Samoa crisis

BY OLIVE SUKUN
A TEAM of health workers has returned home after helping in the measles vaccination campaign in Apia, Samoa.
Team leader Dr Mathias Bauri, the expanded programme officer for immunisation, said the scale of the outbreak was so big that it needed the support of medical specialists from around the world.
“The scale of the outbreak was very big. They had a lot of cases and there were a lot of international partners coming to support the campaign. So we had people from all over the world,” Bauri said.
He said the virus would spread like wildfire in any country which had low immunisation among children.
“Samoa had that problem for some time. So when the virus was imported from New Zealand, it just spread like wildfire among the population who were not vaccinated,” he said.
“That’s why we always talk about that in the country: Get your children vaccinated within the target range of up to two years old.”
Bauri led a team of 11 nurses and a logistics officer. They were based at the Tupua Tamasese Meaole Hospital and served in the Intensive Care Unit, maternity wards, paediatrics, and immunisation.
“It was our first time to respond to an outbreak in another country.”