assessment of Muslims' reactions to the immunization of children in northern Nigeria

ABSTRACT

This study looks into the attitudes of Muslims toward immunization in Nigeria. It also analyzes the reasons for the reluctance to accept immunization by these people of the Islamic faith especially in the northern part of Nigeria. Among the major grievances of Muslims against mmunization is that the polio vaccine, according to source, was laced with substances that could render girls infertile, as part of the USA led a plot to depopulate Africa. Furthermore, it was alleged that the oral polio vaccine [OPV] was extracted from the monkey tissue, rendering it forbidden [haram] to Muslims. The method adopted for this research is purely derived from books, journals, documents, monographs, Internets, archives, newspapers, reports as well as the Glorious Qur'an and Ahadith. The study reveals that the OPV is truly extracted from the tissue of monkeys but had been processed and transformed involving various levels of chemical and biological processes. Therefore, this transformation had made it lawful [halal]. Likewise, the OPV used in Pakistan, Iran, Afghanistan, Egypt, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, and Indonesia is of the same high quality worldwide and from similar sources. No evidence exists supporting the claim that the vaccine is used to depopulate the Muslim world. The population of Muslim countries that had adopted the OPV to eradicate polio has continued to grow at the same rate as it used to before polio campaigns. The paper, therefore, recommended that Muslims should allow their children to take immunization