THE ROLE OF VACCINATION IN LOWERING CHILD RENS DEATH RATES IN SENEGAL

Since the end of World War II, death rates of children and teenagers i n Senegal have fallen. The reduction occurred later in rural areas tha n in the towns and was the result of efforts to decentralize the healt h service after 1978. The spread of health programmes to rural areas w hich occurred after the Alma Ata conference was mainly responsible for lowering the death rate. Implementation of a broader vaccination prog ramme to immunize all children less than five years old, as well as pr egnant women, appears to have played a decisive part in accelerating t he decline in death rates in the recent past, especially in rural area s. We studied child mortality in the rural area of Bandafassi where th e demographic situation has been monitored for some time. The study al so shows that although conditions did not change greatly, vaccination resulted in halving the death rates of children during the first five years of life.