Hundreds of expats get measles jab at Hamriya camp

In what could be deemed a great success, the National Measles Immunisation Campaign’s (NMIC) Hamriya vaccination camp reported several hundreds of recipients, majority expatriates, lining up in the queue often hindering the traffic, to get themselves vaccinated from 10 of this month.

Both the officials from the Ministry of Health and local volunteers were finding it strenuous, if not difficult, to align them in one row and to smoothen the process in time.

“We see a lot of people, mostly Asian expatriates, lining up in the queue to get the dose taken against measles since we began the campaign on September 10. Several thousands of people have already got themselves vaccinated from us”, Mohammed Essa al Zadjali, in-charge of NMIC for Muttrah and Muscat wilayats, and head of the malaria department of the surveillance department at the MoH, said.

There are two camps in Ruwi with one at the heart of the commercial area while the other one is stationed at the Hamriya junction where a vast number of blue-collar workers come together in the evenings whereas as many as 17 teams are scattered across the city.

“Our volunteers have been announcing through the microphone to all the people to come forward and get themselves vaccinated and it is fetching in desired results with friends and relatives of people dwelling in Hamriya walking into this camp”, he added.

The MoH has circulated invitations in all Asian languages, including Hindi, Urdu, Bengali, Tagalog and Singhalese through social media days before the beginning of the second phase of the national campaign and this has resulted in the various expatriate communities making it to the MoH camps across the governorates.

“I know the vaccination is against some disease from the voice message I received last week and that it’s compulsory for people between the ages of 20 to 35. That’s the reason I am here and I feel that I have done something good”, an Asian national, a mason by profession, said.