UNICEF in Brazil | UNICEF USA

UNICEF routinely engages youth in public health campaigns. Above, young people help spread the word about how to prevent the spread of dengue, a painful mosquito-borne disease that is endemic in Brazil — and a much bigger problem due to climate change. @ UNICEF

To improve access to safe water and sanitation, UNICEF focuses on capacity building and strengthening WASH in schools and health facilities.

UNICEF also looks for ways to assist Brazil’s efforts to adapt to climate change, helping to strengthen the resilience of social services as local authorities brace for future climate shocks — including impacts of El Niño.

In response to a record drought in the state of Amazonas — the worst ever recorded — UNICEF is helping municipalities assess and respond to community needs, coordinating efforts with indigenous organizations, other UN agencies and other partners, within a broader climate change adaptation framework.

Child immunization — catching up on routine vaccinations

Improving child immunization rates remains a top public health priority in Brazil and all across Latin America.

Vaccination coverage for children in Brazil under age 5 had been slipping even before the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted routine immunization and other essential health services — causing rates to fall further. 

To help the country catch up — and ensure all children are protected against potentially deadly diseases — UNICEF has helped expand vaccination sites outside of hospitals, bringing services to an array of convenient locations like daycare centers, and helping to train health professionals working in vaccination rooms.

Ivone de Lima, above left, collects her son Samuel, 4, from Rocilda Germano Arruda Early Childhood Education Center in the Beira Rio neighborhood of Baturité, Ceará State, Brazil, where he received his first routine vaccinations as part of a catch-up program supported by UNICEF and partners. “I delayed Samuel’s vaccines because I was busy at work and didn’t have time to go to the community health care center, so having the vaccinations here at the daycare center made it much easier for me,” de Lima said. © UNICEF/U.S. CDC/UNI408820/Érico Hiller

Several municipalities have since implemented programs for locating children under age 5 who are either behind on their vaccines or unvaccinated altogether by visiting schools, homes and town plazas, and arranging for services.

In Manaus, the capital city in the vast rainforest state of Amazonas, health workers are applying these strategies to serve city residents as well as families living in more remote areas, which requires different approaches and creative modes of transport.   

Lindalva de Freitas, a community health worker in Manaus, is often seen walking the city’s streets, going up and down hills, balancing on improvised wooden bridges and when necessary, crossing the river in a canoe. 

“We know that vaccines are important for the child’s health, but many parents delay it because they don’t have the time, because they have to work, because they don’t have money, they can’t come to the Health Unit,” she says. “So, our job needs to be to search for these families on a daily basis.” 

At the Lago do Aleixo Health Unit in Manaus, where de Freitas and colleagues provide on-site care to children in need, recent patients included 4-year-old Gabriel de Oliveria and his two brothers, Kennedy, 5, and Kuana, 10. The boys lost both parents when Gabriel was just a baby.

“I just want to be healthy and strong enough to take care of them and not abandon them,” their grandmother Elmira de Oliveira says. “I want that one day, when they grow up, they can say, ‘My grandmother didn’t give me good clothes or new shoes, but she gave me a roof over my head, took care of me and fought for my health.’”

Nurse Dynnhyfer de Souza prepares a vaccine dose to be administered at the Rocilda Germano Arruda Early Childhood Education Center in Baturité, Ceará State, Brazil, part of a UNICEF-supported campaign to improve childhood immunization rates in the country. © UNICEF/U.S. CDC/UNI408803/Érico Hiller

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Source link : https://www.unicefusa.org/what-unicef-does/where-unicef-works/south-america/brazil

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Publish date : 2024-01-29 17:19:08

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