Anti-measles drive: Private schools must cooperate, urges health minister

Over 2,000 children missed during the campaign thus far

RAWALPINDI/ ISLAMABAD: The federal health minister on Tuesday urged private schools in the federal capital to comply with the ongoing anti-measles campaign even as it emerged that as many as 2,000 children have been missed other their parents had refused vaccination in neighbouring Rawalpindi.

Federal Health Minister Aamer Kiani monitored the ongoing national measles campaign by visiting various health centres on the outskirts of the federal capital.

Speaking to the media, the minister highlighted the need for compliance by private schools to ensure optimum coverage.

Referring to the obstacles which they have faced, Kiani expressed concerns over delays in granting permission by private schools to administer the measles vaccination to students. He also underlined the need for coordination of all departments to ensure a successful measles campaign.

He added that during the two-week-long-campaign, they aimed to vaccinate as many as 32.5 million children between nine months to five years-of-age. Of this, he said that they have thus far achieved around 50 per cent of the target.

Kiani also visited the National Measles Control Room to monitor the real-time coverage of the Campaign. National Programme Manager Dr Syed Saqlain Ahmad Gilani told him that “data from across the country is submitted by the provincial and district teams through a special android app to the centralized national control room. Teams in the room analyses the data identify issues takes immediate measures to address the challenges or mitigate the effects.”

Missed children

Meanwhile, it has emerged that at least 2,000 children were missed in Rawalpindi either because their parents refused to administer the vaccine or the children were not available at home when the teams called.

The campaign, which is being monitored by the UNICEF team, has seen over six million children get vaccinated against measles with a further four days left in the campaign to vaccinate the remaining 2.52 million.

Rawalpindi Health Authority Chief Executive Dr Khalid Mehmood said that they will achieve their target over the next four days.

He added that they will also focus on areas where they have been unable to either reach children or had missed them in these four days.

Urging parents to get their children vaccinated, he said that even if a child had already been vaccinated, there was no harm in vaccinating them again.

An anti-polio campaign is also expected to start from November 12 in the twin cities.

Upgrading facilities

Meanwhile, Punjab Health Minister Dr Yasmeen Rashid has said that they want to increase existing health facilities apart from prioritising patient care at the allied hospitals of the garrison city.

She said this during a surprise visit to the District Headquarters (DHQ) and the Holy Family Hospital (HFH) in Rawalpindi on Tuesday.

Dr Rashid said that they were looking to increase the number of nurses and doctors in these hospitals apart from strengthening equipment stocks, including the provision of two dialysis machines to the DHQ hospital.

To improve service delivery, she said that they were mulling plans to ensure the presence of senior doctors in the emergency wards and other key departments.

Dr Rashid called for improving cleanliness in DHQ hospital, for senior doctors to be regular and on time and prioritise the patient.

At HFH, the provincial health minister visited the gynaecology, paediatrics wards and the operation theatre and spoke to the patients there.

When a scheme for improving the gynaecology and paediatrics wards was proposed to the provincial minister, she assured officials that the requisite funds will be provided for the projects apart from the provision of additional staff, doctors and nurses.

Moreover, she said that the quality of treatment of children was also being improved. 

Published in The Express Tribune, October 24^th, 2018.