Vaccines are not rejected but their halal status that is questioned
The second phase of the national measles-rubella (MR) vaccination program is on the brink of failure amid the public’s anti-vaccine sentiments. By the middle of last week, the program, run throughout August and September, only managed to achieve 49.07 percent coverage of the 95 percent to be achieved by the end of September. The regions with the low coverage rate of below 30 percent are South Sumatra, South Kalimantan, Bangka Belitung, West Nusa Tenggara, West Sumatra and Riau with Aceh topping the list with 4.94 percent.
Tempo
September 25, 2018
The health ministry’s disease prevention and control director-general Anung Sugihantono explained that the low coverage in the 28 provinces outside Java was caused by the public’s concerns over the vaccine’s halal (allowable) status as the India-made serum had yet to be certified halal by the Indonesian Ulama Council (MUI). “People in almost all the regions questioned this,” Anung explained to Tempo’s Devy Erni
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