Parents of forcefully vaccinated children demand govt intervention

Parents of the children who were forcefully vaccinated in schools without their consent are calling for government intervention, noting that they are worried about their children's health. This comes after the Ministry of Health stopped schools from vaccinating students without parents’ consent.

Some of the parents who have children at Mbalala Secondary School in Mukono District want authorities to intervene and arrest the school administrators for forcefully vaccinating students.

Ms Alice Nakasi, a parent said her daughter had received one dose of AstraZeneca during the holidays and had not reached the period of receiving the second one but was forced to receive Pfizer shortly after the first one.

Mr Jimmy Mugisha also a parent said his son had already received his two doses of the vaccine but because he didn't carry the vaccination card to school, he was forced to receive the doses afresh noting that it was wrong and his son is always complaining of a headache.

"Forcing students to vaccinate is denying them their right because people have different reasons and their voices should also be listened to," he noted.

Mr Moses Lubega another parent said his son's body is always weak but he was forced by the school administrators to vaccinate which makes him worried about his health.

Some of the students explained: "We were in class and teachers ordered us to go to one of the rooms and locked us there and then asked the health officials to vaccinate us."

They said for those who had their vaccination cards indicating that they were fully vaccinated were left to go back to class.

"Some of us had left our cards at home but we were forced into vaccinating again which is not right," they said.

Ms Hamida Nakato, a parent said she did not wish her child to get vaccinated though she had not yet received any vaccine.

Our reporter tried to reach out to the school administrators but wasn't successful as their known telephone numbers were not reachable.

The Minister for Health, Dr Ruth Acheng, said schools are not allowed to vaccinate children without consulting parents.

"School children will be vaccinated during the holidays and it's the parents to decide whether to take their children for the vaccine or not," she said.

However, Mukono Resident District Commissioner, Ms Fatuma Ndisaba, defended the schools saying it was an excellent move to vaccinate children as its one way of enforcing government programmes.

"Many schools have already vaccinated their students and there are reporting no harm," she said.

Mr Emmanuel Ainebyoona, the Health Ministry spokesperson, said they are investigating issues of adverse reaction after the Covid-19 vaccination.

“We released the guidelines on which vaccine to administer for a particular age group. Any health worker that violates this will be held culpable. Our team is still investigating the issue of adverse reactions,” he said.

The ministry is looking into an incident where a teenager experienced multiple organ failures after allegedly receiving a Covid-19 jab.

The 14-year-old (name withheld) was admitted to Kiruddu Referral Hospital with body swelling shortly after he was allegedly vaccinated at St Martin Secondary School, Mpigi in February.