Anti-measles campaign: Vaccination drive to begin in Bahawalpur on July 8

Two children die of measles at Bahawal Victoria Hospital.

BAHAWALPUR:

Two children died from measles on Thursday.

Six-year-old Muhammad Tariq of Basti Sahlaan and three-year-old Muhammad Iqbal of Ahmadpur East had been under treatment at the Bahawal Victoria Hospital.

Talking to The Express Tribune Zakir Ali, the district coordinator for the Expanded Programme of Immunisation, told The Express Tribune that one of the children was admitted to the hospital late on Wednesday night. He said the child was in critical condition and died at 7:30 am.

Ali said that 21 children were currently under treatment at the BVH.

Immunisation campaign

The 10-day anti-measles vaccination campaign in Bahawalpur district will begin on July 8. Ali said 900,000 children aged between six months and 10 years will be vaccinated in the drive. He said District Coordination Officer Sajid Zafar had held a meeting to review the arrangements.

Sharing the meeting minutes, Ali said the DCO had directed the officials concerned to ensure that no child was left out in the immunisation drive.

The DCO said the officials should make sure that there were enough measles vaccine and vitamin-A drops.

Special vaccination centres would be established at every union council’s hospitals and schools, where children would be vaccinated between 8am to 5pm. As many as 439 teams will be on duty.

For four days (July 15 to July 18) the teams would visit schools. Ali said District Coordination Officer had directed the officials concerned to ensure presence of children at their school during this time.

He said school administrations had been issued rosters in this regard.

Every union council will have a monitoring officer.  Assistant commissioners and executive district officers will monitor the campaign at tehsil level. District Coordination Officer would monitor the entire district.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 5^th, 2013.