Coverage of Child Immunisation and Its Determinants in India

Abstract

For reducing morbidity, mortality and disabilities from the six serious but preventable diseases—that is, tuberculosis, diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, poliomyelitis and measles—the government of India initiated Expanded Programme on Immunisation by making free vaccination services easily available to all eligible children. Despite considerable gains in immunisation coverage, a large chunk of children die from vaccine preventable diseases. The article sheds light on the coverage of child immunisation in India and estimates the effect of selected demographic and socio-economic characteristics on immunisation coverage. Data for the study have been utilised from DLHS-RCH, conducted during 2002–04. Both bi-variate and multivariate techniques have been carried out in due course of analysis. Multivariate analysis in the form of multinomial logistic regression is employed to see the net effect of each of the independent variables on the dependant variable, that is, immunisation (no immunisation, any immunisation and full immunisation). The different background characteristics considered for the study are age of mother, educational level of mother, birth order, sex of the child, place of residence, religion, caste and standard of living of the household, antenatal care (ANC) and geographical region. The result reveals that about half the children are fully immunised but one-fifth of the children have not been immunised. There is a substantial variation in full immunisation across background variables. Those children are more likely to be fully immunised whose mothers are more educated. Besides this, the sex of the child, place of residence and standard of living of the household also show statistically significant effect on full immunisation.