August 11, 2023
Action needed on meningitis threat
Meningitis Foundation Aotearoa says unless more funding is targeted towards public awareness about meningitis, people will continue to die.
Parliament’s health select committee has endorsed its petition calling for free vaccinations for the most at risk groups including babies, the very young, and adolescents.
Foundation chair Gerard Rushton says Māori and Pasifika peoples are by far the most at risk groups.
“Māori and Pasfika are 4 to 5 times more likely to contract the disease. And in fact, at the moment, we’re sitting at around 70 percent of our cases are Maori and Pasifika.
Gerard Rushton says current low vaccination rates among Māori and Pasifika worsens the risks – and having lost one of his own children to the illness, he wants to spare families that grief.