Childhood immunization is one of the routine health services that are being disrupted by COVID-19 in Africa. The ‘COVID-19 and routine childhood immunization in Africa: leveraging systems thinking and implementation science to improve immunization system performance’ article proposes that policymakers need to identify robust and context-specific strategies to rapidly scale-up routine immunization. This quick decision-making can thwart the likely increase in epidemics of vaccine-preventable diseases, caused by disruption of vaccination service provision, prevent resultant child mortality, and mitigate the impact of COVID-19 on national immunization performance.
The paper’s main recommendation is a paradigm shift towards systems thinking and the use of implementation science, as systems thinking can inform a more nuanced and holistic understanding of the interrelationship that between COVID-19, its control strategies, and childhood immunization.
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