S. Zimicki et al., IMPROVING VACCINATION COVERAGE IN URBAN AREAS THROUGH A HEALTH COMMUNICATION CAMPAIGN - THE 1990 PHILIPPINE EXPERIENCE, Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 72(3), 1994, pp. 409-422
From March to September 1990 the Philippine Department of Health, with
the assistance of the HEALTHCOM Project, carried out a national mass-
media communication campaign to support routine vaccination services.
The essential elements of the campaign strategy were as follows: focus
ing on measles as a way to get mothers to bring their children to the
health centre; emphasizing logistic knowledge in the mass-media messag
es, in particular popularizing a single day of the week as ''vaccinati
on day'' and giving clear information about the age for measles vaccin
ation; and focusing on urban areas, which had lower vaccination rates
than rural areas. Evaluation of the effects of the campaign indicates
an increase in vaccination coverage and a substantial increase in the
timeliness of vaccination that can be attributed to improvement in car
ers' knowledge about vaccination. Furthermore, most of the observed in
crease in knowledge was related to exposure to the mass-media campaign
. There was no evidence of any programmatic change that could account
for the increase in vaccination or evidence that increased health educ
ation efforts at health centres could account for the change in knowle
dge.These results indicate that when countries meet certain conditions
- a high level of access to the media, sufficient expertise and funds
available to develop and produce high-quality radio and television ad
vertisements, and a routine system that is able to serve the increased
demand - a mass communication campaign can significantly improve vacc
ination coverage.