CPAR Uganda Ltd

Government has been advocating for mainly essential workers and those in a particular age bracket (50+) to get the vaccination. This may have made many young people to have little interests in looking for Covid19 vaccines.

Within our research area, Lira, I asked some young persons and they said their parents went and for them they didn’t go, since the Government said elders first. For those who went, some told me they went like twice and found vaccines not available; or that the vaccination was done only on given specific dates.

Most hospitals in Lira only vaccinate on Tuesdays or Fridays. These vaccination days don’t favour some young people who work and are only off-duty over the weekends. Indeed, getting Covid19 vaccine has been a hard struggle for Ugandans.

Nevertheless, I got my first doze in April 2021, then I was told to report back to the hospital for the second doze after eight weeks. But later, I went and again and I was told to go back after more four weeks. I asked why, then the nurse told me they (Ministry of Health) had changed the duration between receiving the first and the second doze to 12 weeks.

I came back home and later heard it over the local radio in Lira that government has brought in more dozes of the vaccines, but that it is recommended for only those getting their second doze only. I went to the same hospital (P.A.G Mission Hospital in Lira City) and got my second doze.

This was after two weeks of the additional four weeks that the nurse had told me were added on. Which means I got my second doze 10 weeks after I got my first doze.  I was given the vaccination card with all the vaccination dates recorded. People have varied second doze duration – between eight to twelve months.

By James Opollo, a young adult that is benefiting from the CPAR Uganda project: “Mentoring young adults into innovators against poverty”, and because of that is also participating as a researcher in another CPAR Uganda project: “Challenging Categories: Educated unemployed youth as institutional innovators in rural Uganda” that CPAR Uganda is implementing in partnership with Lira University and the University of East Anglia.