Vaccination drive: Towards a polio-free Punjab
Sialkot Executive District Officer (EDO) (Health) Dr Syed Talat Iqbal recently presided over a meeting of the District Anti-Polio Committee here. District officer (Health) Dr Ziaul Hassan, Government Allama Iqbal memorial DHQ Hospital medical superintendent Dr Zafar Awan, Patients Welfare Society District president Zafar Malik (Daska) and Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) president Dr Masudul Syed were present on the occasion. “We are taking special measures to ensure that vans are deployed all around the province to make it easier for people to bring their children in,” said DO Hassan.
The EDO said that a total of 1,037 mobile teams had been assigned to make door-to-door visits in the district, 130 teams would operate from BHUs and hospitals.
“We have deployed 49 transit teams that will give the polio vaccine doses to the children under the age of 5 years at railway stations, bus stops and other public places,” Iqbal said, adding that 46 zonal supervisors and 215 area supervisors in the Sialkot district would monitor the operations. “We hope that Sialkot will soon be a polio-free district,” PMA president Syed said.Meanwhile, in Faisalabad over 1.2 million children up to the age of five are to be administered polio drops during the anti polio campaign in the district. District coordination officer (DCO) Naseem Sadiq said that all necessary arrangements in this regard had been made and mobile teams were already scouring the district. The DCO and EDO (HEALTH) Dr Rasheed said that 2,732 teams of the health department would remain active to administer polio drops during the campaign. Out of the total teams, 2,210 mobile teams would pay door-to-door visits. The DCO directed health department officials to aim for a 100 per cent eradication target during their efforts. “Our efforts are strengthened because we know that we are so close to achieving a Polio-free Pakistan,” the DCO said. with additional reporting by PPI
Published in The Express Tribune, December 29th, 2010.
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