Background: The sickle gene confers an increased vulnerability to infection, particularly to certain bacterial
pathogens, and this has significantly contributed to morbidity and mortality in individuals with sickle cell disease.
Immunization plays an important role in the prevention of infection in children with sickle cell disease; we sought
to assess the pneumococcal vaccination rate of children with this disease in Port Harcourt, Nigeria.
Materials and Methods: This was a cross-sectional questionnaire based study of children with sickle cell disease
presenting in the Sickle Cell Clinic of the University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital, Nigeria from January
2013 to December 2013.
Results: There were 181 children with sickle cell disease. One hundred and seventy nine (98.9%) of them were SS
genotype while 2(1.1%) children had SC genotype. Immunization coverage according to the National Programme
on Immunization was 172 (95.1 %). The rates for other specific vaccines, range from 102(66.2%) for the antiHaemophilus influenza vaccine in the form of pentavalent vaccine to 10(5.5%) for the pneumococci. The major
reasons for non-vaccination of pneumococcal were unavailable in Government Health Facility, ignorance, lack of
proper education on the need of the vaccine and the outrageous cost of these vaccines for the families who knew
about them.
Conclusion: The immunization coverage for pneumococcal infections among children with sickle cell disease is
poor. These results propose the need for a national program against sickle cell disease, which should license health
facilities to include pneumococcal vaccine in their routine vaccination program.
Pneumococcal Vaccination Status of Children with Sickle Cell Disease in Port
Harcourt, Nigeria
