MURCIA (EP). Starting today, approximately 30,000 children aged 3 and 4 years in the Murcia Region will receive the intranasal flu vaccine this year at their schools, to make immunization easier for families.

health advisor, Juan José Pedreñoand Education, Vocational Training and Employment, Victor Marinthey visited the school this Wednesday Saint Felix of Zarandona on the occasion of the start of vaccination for minors.

A flu vaccination campaign for the entire community will begin soon and details will be announced soon, local government sources said in a statement.

Pedreño explained that “administration of vaccines in schools facilitates the immunization of minors, so that parents do not need to take them to health centers or regular vaccination sites for this purpose.”

Meanwhile, the Minister of Education has underlined that “with vaccination in educational centers, classrooms become safer, both minors and their classmates are protected and the likelihood of outbreaks and absences from school is reduced, especially in populations with the highest levels of disease. risk of social exclusion”.

Last year, school children aged 2, 3 and 4 received flu vaccinations at their health center. In the 2022-2023 campaign, the Region of Murcia is the only autonomous community to vaccinate minors with the intranasal vaccine, so that they avoid being jabbed.

Due to the very safe characteristics of intranasal vaccines, almost no side effects and very easy to administer, flu vaccination is considered to be carried out in school settings, which is common practice in many countries that use this vaccine. like in England.

This initiative was tested on a pilot basis with children in grades 1 and 2 of Early Childhood Education in 24 schools in the region with very satisfactory results, both in terms of increasing coverage and on the part of the children’s parents and guardians. vaccinated minors.

Flu in children under 5 years of age can be a serious illness, because it causes a high number of visits to the pediatrician and also hospital stays.

Of the total number of seriously ill children under 5 years of age who were hospitalized due to this disease, 68.4 percent, as well as more than half of children admitted to intensive care, had no known risk factors. This means that even if the children are healthy, they are hospitalized solely because of the flu.

Therefore, the Region of Murcia is one of three communities, together with Galicia and Andalusia, included in the 2022-2023 flu vaccination campaign in healthy minors between the ages of 6 and 59 months, as recommended by the World Health Organization . Health and has been carried out in various countries in Spain for many years. Other communities will introduce flu vaccinations in the 2023-2024 campaign.

Last year, thanks to vaccination, flu in the region was not as serious as in other regions of Spain. The aim of the Ministry is to continue this step this year and make school classrooms safer from flu.