Preparations for three-day polio inoculation drive complete

This is our national responsibility, says Bahawalpur Health EDO

LAHORE/BHAKKAR/BAHAWALPUR: Members of the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (GAVI) have appreciated the use of the e-VACCS system to monitor polio and measles inoculation in the Punjab, Health Department officials told the chief minister at a meeting ahead of a nationwide immunisation drive starting on Monday (today).

Officials of the Health Department said that GAVI members had lauded Punjab’s role in trying to interrupt poliovirus transmission in the province and said it had the best inoculation programme in the country.

The e-VACCS system, developed and run with the cooperation of the Punjab Information Technology Board, is an effective tool in ensuring implementation of Punjab’s strategy to eradicate polio, the officials said. The GAVI members also expressed interest in introducing the e-VACCS system in 10 other countries, they said.

Preparations for the routine inoculation drive on Monday are complete and more than two million children will be vaccinated in the Punjab, a spokesperson of the Polio Emergency Operation Centre told journalists on Sunday.  More than 6,000 mobile teams have been constituted. They will be provided security, he said.

Bhakkar Health DO Muhammad Nawaz said more than 255,000 children under the age of five years will be inoculated in Bhakkar district. The drive will continue for three days. All appointments for polio teams and supervisory staff are complete, he said. There are 719 teams constituted for the drive in Bhakkar. There are 180 supervisory in-charge officials in each union council.

Dr Nawaz said there will be a two-day round (on March 17 and 18) to vaccinate children who might have been left out in the three-day vaccination drive. The district officer urged parents to get their children vaccinated and prevent them from getting disabled.

Bahawalpur DCO Ehtasham Anwar inaugurated the immunisation campaign by vaccinating children at the Bahawal Victoria Hospital on Sunday.

He said teams of the district Health Department would go door-to-door vaccinating children between March 14 and March 18. “There shouldn’t be a single child under the age of five years in Bahawalpur who isn’t vaccinated,” he told Health Department officials.

The DCO told them to file performance report every day during the campaign. “No negligence or mistakes will be tolerated.”

Health EDO Shahid Khaleeq said they would vaccinate 597,000 children during the three-day campaign. He requested parents to cooperate with the Health Department’s teams and to ensure that their children were vaccinated without delay. “This is our national responsibility.” He said if a polio team had failed to arrive in any area, parents should approach the nearest health centre or contact the Health Department and lodge a complaint.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 14^th, 2016.