Co-creating Community Voice, Resilience, and Action for Immunization Services

Abstract for Preformed Panel Presentation from the 2022 International SBCC Summit in Morocco:

"Since the adoption of a National Health Policy in 2007, several efforts have been made to integrate quality of care in Ghana. A quality assurance program and robust legal and policy environment have been in place for two decades. However, what a consolidated and comprehensive strategy for quality services looks like remains unclear. The health system is faced with weak organizational and management capacity, resource mobilization, and accountability systems; calls were made to integrate community support to address system challenges.The Community-based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) program was adopted to integrate community voice and input into health planning and delivery of essential community-based health services. This program has become one of the strongest service delivery entries for community participation in immunization activities. Nonetheless, the program's persistent over reliance on top-down policy and program implementation has adversely impacted community response to services. With communities predominantly organized around social norms and behaviors, this process prevents acceleration of community ownership, trust, and sustained demand for immunization.To establish the connection between social norms and behaviors and immunization service experience, JSI Research and Training Institute (JSI) supported the integration of human-centered design (HCD) approaches into community-based immunization modules for microplanning and demand generation for immunization in urban poor communities. The initiative mobilized immunization activities to reach over 1600 caregivers with second year of life vaccination information and services and address COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy. This has provided traction for scaling of people-centered approaches into community-based immunization modules."