TEHRAN –The national program for pneumococcal vaccination of babies under one year of age started today all over the country.

The pneumococcal shots are effective at preventing respiratory diseases, meningitis, and ear inflammatory diseases, IRIB quoted Hassan Farshidi, an official with the health ministry, as saying.

The vaccination is estimated to prevent the annual death of 1,100 children and the hospital admissions of more than 10,000 babies in the country.

Pneumococcal vaccine can be injected when babies are two, four, and 12 months old.

On February 20, the program was officially launched in the city of Bandar Khamir, southern Hormozgan province, IRNA reported.

The vaccination program to combat pneumococcal has been added to the country's immunization program, Pedram Pak-Aein, an official with the ministry of health, said.

It will be implemented in several phases, with the priority given to underdeveloped areas, he added.

Some 3.5 million doses of pneumococcal vaccine have been imported. In the first phase, the vaccines will be distributed in deprived areas of the southern provinces of the country, the official explained.

Pak-Aein went on to say that vaccination against rotavirus will start in the calendar month starting February 20 aiming to prevent the hospitalization of 10,000 children per year.

Knowledge-based companies and domestic manufacturers will soon produce both pneumococcal and rotavirus vaccines and present them to the market within the next few months.

On April 13,  Pak-Aein said, "The vaccination program against pneumococcal and rotavirus will focus on tropical and southern regions of the country."

“The immunization initiative will begin in the coming weeks in provinces that are most vulnerable to these diseases,” IRNA quoted Pak-Aein as saying.

Rotavirus vaccination program will target tropical, southern, and south-eastern provinces, while pneumococcal vaccination will be extended to southern provinces as well, he added.

The nationwide implementation of the vaccination program will commence as soon as needed pneumococcal and rotavirus vaccines are provided, Pak-Aein further noted.

On May 12, the national vaccination program against rotavirus and pneumococcal started in seven more provinces of the country.

The seven provinces were Khorasan Razavi, South Khorasan, North Khorasan, Sistan-Baluchestan, Hormozgan, Bushehr, Khuzestan, and Ilam, IRNA reported.

Annual rotavirus vaccination prevents the hospitalization of over 50,000 individuals. It will also prevent some 1,200 deaths caused by severe cases of diarrhea.

MT/MG