Childhood vaccination trends among the Maasai nomadic pastoralists: Insights from a community-based vaccine registry in Kenya

• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgph.0004077
• Publication Date: 2025-03-25T23:40:25Z
• Authors: Julius Nyerere Od...; Carrie B. Dolan; Evelyn Thompson; Katie O’Neill; John Sankok; Rose Kimani
• Keywords: Pneumococcal Conjugate Vaccine; Rotavirus vaccine; Polio vaccine; Rubella vaccine; Vaccine-preventable diseases; Measles-Mumps-Rubella Vaccine

Inequities in vaccination timeliness and coverage contribute to disparities childhood health survival. Regular, reliable estimates are needed take programmatic action track progress towards initiatives such as the Immunization Agenda 2030. This study assessed timeliness, coverage, drop-out rates of reported immunization data from a community healthcare registry. We retrospectively reviewed records 8487 children across 176 villages. The proportion receiving early, timely delayed was computed by vaccine, village year. Coverage each vaccine calculated number doses divided who received Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG), birth dose serving service-based denominator. Vaccine dropout year estimated first but did not receive subsequent dose. For multi-dose vaccines, on-time were highest for declined with doses. largest declines between third observed DPT (29.07%), Pneumococcal Conjugate (28.84%), Oral Polio (28.79%). Measles-Rubella had rate (64.66%) its two doses, largely due delays administering second at 18 months. Overall, steadily mid-2020 2022, proximity facilities strongly linked higher lower rates. confirmed that level significantly below national targets. Understanding factors affecting this is important building strong sustainable ecosystem hard-to-reach communities.