Japan and the UN Children's Fund, UNICEF on Friday exchanged notes on a six billion-cedi Japanese grant to Ghana for the immunisation of almost eight million children against poliomyelitis and measles.

The grant, which is under the "Project for Infectious Diseases Prevention for Children", would be used to purchase 4.5 million doses of oral polio vaccine, 2.8 million doses of measles vaccines, syringes and safety boxes. Mr Motoyoshi Noro, Charge d'Affaires at the Japan Embassy and Dr Ramesh Shrestha, UNICEF Representative in Ghana signed. Mr Moses Dani Baah, Deputy Minister of Health, witnessed it.

Mr Noro said the Japanese government had noted the achievements Ghana, through the Ministry of Health and its field workers with the support of UNICEF staff and volunteers, had made so far in polio eradication efforts. He said Japan, as the largest contributor to the polio eradication programme over the last five years was pleased to be associated with the achievements. Mr Noro said the cumulative contribution of Japan since 1997 to date was 53 billion cedis and praised the success of the National Immunisation Days (NID) programmes, which, he noted, is reflected in the overall national oral polio vaccination coverage increasing from 50 per cent in 1996 to about 79 per cent in 2001. He, however, said that there were six districts where oral polio vaccination is less than 70 per cent or NID coverage of less than 80 per cent.

Mr Noro added that 54 districts, including the six, would be the target during the next NID exercise from October 4-6 for the first round and 1-3 November for the second. He said Japan would support the accelerated measles control programme, which is part of a five-year Expanded Programme of Immunisation (EPI) strategic plan.

Mr Noro said a success rate of 98 per cent coverage of mass measles campaign achieved in the Central Region in 2001 provided an encouraging background to extend the programme to the other nine regions. He said Japan would provide funds to procure vaccines and injection materials for the supplementary immunisation activities. About eight million children between nine months and 15 years are to be immunised in the exercise, which comes off in 9-15 December.

Mr Shrestha said Ghana was getting close to becoming a polio-free country and that attention would now be focused on other infectious diseases. Mr Baah described the signing of the agreement as another milestone in the relations between Ghana and Japan and said the Ministry of Health would organise massive campaigns against measles.