The Katsina State Government, in partnership with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), has announced plans to vaccinate about 4.8 million children against measles-rubella (MR) beginning in October.

This was disclosed by Rahama Fara, Chief of UNICEF’s Kano Field Office, during a media dialogue and mobilisation event in Katsina on Tuesday.

Fara explained that Katsina had received 3,698,500 doses of the Novel Oral Polio Vaccine (NOPV2) to cover 2.3 million children under five years old. The vaccination will be carried out under the Directly Observed Oral Polio Vaccination (DOOPV) strategy.

He noted that Nigeria’s integrated campaign will run in two phases across all 36 states from October 6, 2025, to February 13, 2026, with Katsina scheduled to implement its polio-MR campaign from October 6 to 13.

According to him, 2,253 teams will be deployed to administer the vaccines using fixed and temporary post strategies between October 4 and 13. In addition, 5,584 teams will provide routine immunisation and administer other antigens from October 6 to 10.

“These teams will include 3,761 house-to-house teams, 993 operating in transit or special points, and 830 at fixed posts,” he said. “UNICEF has also trained 3,300 health workers in people skills and 600 members of Non-Compliance Resolution Teams (NCRTs) to address resistance during the exercise.”

He revealed that 200 NCRTs, each comprising a community leader, traditional leader, and vaccinator, will be deployed to handle non-compliance cases in real time. The campaign will also be supported by six state facilitators, 21 LGA facilitators, 462 voluntary ward supervisors, and 4,647 voluntary community mobilisers.

To further strengthen community buy-in, Fara said 34 LGA chairmen and 70 district heads have signed a declaration pledging their support for the immunisation drive.

“While we acknowledge the progress made so far, our goal of halting the circulation of the polio virus in Katsina State is yet to be attained,” he cautioned. “Katsina recorded two cases of the variant poliovirus in Danmusa LGA this year, compared to 17 cases across eight LGAs in 2024, including eight from Batsari.”

Also speaking, the Executive Secretary of the Katsina State Primary Health Care Agency, Shamsuddeen Yahaya, stressed the importance of the campaign given the devastating impact of measles on children.

“We’ve found evidence that rubella is also widespread in Katsina, though underreported. This campaign offers us a great opportunity to protect our children,” Yahaya said. “Alongside the MR campaign, we’ll run our regular polio vaccination targeting children aged zero to 59 months. Nigeria is on the verge of eliminating the circulating variant poliovirus, and this exercise is critical to that effort.”