The HSE has confirmed that students will be bringing home immunisation consent packs if they are in first year or Junior Infants.
The HSE’s National Immunisation Office is asking parents to keep an eye out for these and is urging them to return these completed to the school, consenting to vaccination of their child as soon as possible.
Dr Lucy Jessop, Consultant in Public Health Medicine – National Immunisations Lead, HSE National Immunisation Office said: “COVID-19 has disrupted our school immunisation programmes. We want to achieve high levels of uptake for these programmes during the 2022/23 academic year to prevent outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases.
We know one case of measles can cause an additional 12-15 cases and we know that meningitis can be very serious very quickly. We also know that HPV causes 1 in 20 cancers worldwide. Vaccination is vitally important to protect children from preventable diseases such as measles, whooping cough and polio amongst others.”
The majority of vaccines will be given on school premises but if this isn’t possible, the HSE will invite students and their parents to a local clinic
Absolutely thrilled to see this. Restrictions over the last few years have seen vaccination rates drop, but we can now reverse that trend through the #HPVvaccine, which prevents most types of cervical #cancer.#CancerAwareness#ThankYouLaura#ProtectOurFuture https://t.co/AcYfGzC7ME
— 𝙅𝙤𝙝𝙣 𝙒𝙖𝙡𝙡 (@walls2) September 26, 2022