There are more than eight million reasons to celebrate the 30-year journey of the Perth-based Meningitis Centre Australia, says its co-founder, Bruce Langoulant.
When Professor Fiona Stanley called a group of parents and health professionals to explore the opportunity for a local meningitis advocacy group in 1991, her inspiration was to protect WA babies from a deadly disease.
Meningitis was not well known or well understood, and it was killing and disabling very young children regularly across our state and nation.
Those parents who assembled knew this. The health professionals did too and were fighting its symptoms often with little time. Meningitis progresses quickly and dangerously especially in our very young children.
The motivation for the meeting was the pending arrival of the first infant vaccine for Hib – a bacterial infection causing 40% of the meningitis cases in the early 1990s – and the need to raise public awareness.
The Meningitis Centre was created with a mix of these clinicians and parents and launched on April 24, 1992, in Perth by Prof Stanley, with me, a parent, as its chair.
The centre set about raising awareness of the early signs and symptoms of meningitis and providing support to families. It also launched the ‘Wipe it Out’ campaign to get the Hib vaccine onto the state’s vaccine schedule, and make it free for all babies.
The WA Government decided to introduce and fund the Hib vaccine and it was subsequently added to the National Immunisation Plan (NIP) for all Australian babies born.
Since its introduction in 1993, an estimated 8.1 million babies have received the Hib vaccine free and Hib meningitis today is rarely seen. It remains on the NIP.
Every year, the estimated 300,000 babies born have the Hib vaccine as part of the free and routine infant vaccine program.
As Meningitis Centre Australia (MCA) celebrates its 30th anniversary, it can also celebrate the addition of the pneumococcal vaccine in 2005 for infants and the meningococcal ACWY vaccine in 2016-18 for infants and for teens. Both were added to the NIP and are free and part of the routine schedule.
MCA campaigned with parents and survivors and medical professionals for several years to achieve these life-saving successes. The participation of those impacted by telling their stories to the media and key decision makers was instrumental in the governments of the day taking positive action.
While the primary messages of looking out for the early signs and symptoms – and parents know their child best – are still hallmarks of the 30 years of MCA today, the addition of lifesaving vaccines has been the big gain.
As the founding and current chair, I have shared my daughter’s incredible survival from pneumococcal meningitis in 1989 over this time. Ashleigh’s life has been dramatically impacted and has been the driving force for me to protect others.
It’s a legacy which MCA has embraced and continues with its team to consistently remind parents in particular to Know Act Vax – know the signs and symptoms, act immediately if concerned and vaccinate for protection.
MCA has the latest in resources and is regularly giving presentations at schools and daycare centres and for CALD and indigenous groups.
Australian families and their doctors and at least the 8.1 million babies born so far since 1993 are in a safer place due to MCA’s persistent work and the key decisions made to launch the centre in 1992.