Uganda’s health minister demands robust data entry of vaccinated persons

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The Minister of Health Dr Jane Ruth Aceng

Kampala, Uganda | URN | The Minister for Health Dr Jane Ruth Aceng has tasked district leaders in the Ankole sub-region to recruit more data entrants at vaccination centres.

Dr Aceng was speaking at the launch of the accelerated COVID-19 vaccination campaign for the 13 districts forming the Ankole sub-region at Igongo cultural centre on Monday 13, December 2021.

She said that each district should recruit 10 data entrants to sit at the main center while at each vaccination center, there should be two data entrants.

She says that the statistics will help the Ministry of Health in offering digital COVID-19 vaccination certificates that are recognized world over to avoid the quarantines and testings’ in other countries.

Dr Diana Atwine, the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Health said that because of poor data capture, Uganda is being ranked wrongly.

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She said that the current vaccination coverage is much higher than what is being presented on the World Health Organisation (WHO) dashboard.

She tasked the district leaders to mobilise the young boys and girls in the villages that are waiting to go back to schools to support data entry.

Silvestre Augubashongorera, the chairperson LC V Rubirizi district said that people are freely taking up the vaccine but they are challenged by the lack of enough vaccines in the districts.

According to the data at Mbarara Regional Referral Hospital, only 13,000 persons have so far been vaccinated and as the acceleration vaccination programme is launched, it is targeting to vaccinate the 1.6 million persons in the Ankole sub-region that has 13 districts including Bushenyi, Mbarara, Ntungamo, Kazo, Kiruhura, Isingiro and Sheema among others.