Editor,

The King Faisal Hospital management is writing to dispel the notion that the BCG vaccine is out of stock; an allegation that was published in the Letters page of the 22nd September, by Mugisha Sharon.

First of all, we wish to inform everyone that we have enough stock of all the required vaccines and we have not run out of any of these important vaccines. It is unfortunate that the author of the letter (King Faisal Hospital can do better) published on Wednesday September 22nd 2010, is misleading the public to what transpired on Friday September 17th.

KFH, K gives immunization every Friday from 9:00- 3:00 pm in order to gather a large number of babies to give vaccines to. We do this (immunization clinic) once a week to honor and follow a Ministerial directive that prevents wastage of this particular vaccine.

The BCG vaccine comes in stock vials of 20 doses, and the directive is to only open it when we can use between 10 - 12 doses (for 10 – 12 babies), because once it is opened we have to dispose of the unused portion.

On that very Friday, we served all the babies except for three that had came late and as the number (3) didn’t warrant opening of a new vial, the parents were requested to book for the next immunization clinic which is the normal practice.

Muhoza Adeline
King Faisal Hospital

Public Relations & Marketing Manager