The President Muhamma­du Buhari-led govern­ment has been advised to use the monies recovered from looters to fund immunization programmes and other press­ing health issues in the country.
 
A coalition of youth drawn from Bauchi, Kaduna, Kano and Niger made the call in a commu­niqué they issued at the end of a 2-day Routine Immunization Youth Champions retreat or­ganized by Community Health and Research Initiative (CHR) through Partnership for Advo­cacy in Child and Family Health (PACFaH), in Kaduna.
 
The youths who represented a coalition of CHR-PACFaH Civ­il Society Organisations (CSOs), where trained to support immu­nization financing advocacy in Nigeria.
 
They also urged the Fed­eral Government to develop what they described as a sus­tainable domestic plan for vac­cine financing considering that GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance has since began its five year exit plan from vaccine financing support for the country.
 
The youth further advised the Federal Government to, apart from increasing budgetary al­location for immunization, de­vice possible innovative financ­ing mechanism through taxes in order to bridge immuniza­tion funding gaps in the country.
 
According to the commu­niqué: “As youth, the future of our country is now. Every youth must realize that and play his or her role to ensure funding for immunization for Nigerian children.”
 
They called on the govern­ments at all levels to develop realisable plan for sustainable immunization financing in or­der to save vulnerable Nigerian children from dying as a result of preventable causes.
 
Traditional and religious leaders, on their part, have been urged to effectively use their po­sitions to actively participate in immunization advocacy to gov­ernment at all levels by ensuring community participation.