Peshawar - Chief Secretary of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Nadeem Aslam Chaudhary, formally launched the seven-day anti-polio campaign by administering polio drops to children at the Police Services Hospital in Peshawar.
Secretary of Health Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Adil Shah, Commissioner of Peshawar Division, Riaz Mehsud, Deputy Commissioner of Peshawar, Sarmad Salim Akram, and other officials were also present on the occasion.
Talking to the media persons, the Chief Secretary said that, unfortunately, 18 cases of polio have been reported in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa so far. He noted that due to various reasons, a large number of children miss out on protective vaccines, resulting in more cases. One of the main challenges is that some parents do not vaccinate their children against polio.
He further said that, in addition to the door-to-door campaign for the convenience of parents, the availability of the anti-polio vaccine has been ensured in all hospitals so that parents can benefit from this facility.
The Chief Secretary appealed to parents to fully cooperate with the polio teams during the seven-day campaign and to fulfil their national duty by ensuring that all children receive the polio vaccine. He emphasized that the eradication of the polio virus from the country is only possible through joint and vigorous efforts.
Meanwhile, a meeting was held at the office of the Chief Secretary of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, presided over by Chief Secretary Nadeem Aslam Chaudhary and Federal Secretary of Health Nadeem Mehboob. During this meeting, anti-polio measures in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were reviewed in detail.
7.3m children to be vaccinated in KP
The final anti polio vaccination campaign of the current year started across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on Monday wherein nearly 7.3 million children under the age of five would be vaccinated against the crippling disease.
According to the Emergency Operations Centre for Polio in the province, the five-day campaign aimed to administer polio drops to all children under the age of five. It mentioned that so far, 18 cases of polio were reported from KP during this year adding that in order to curb its spread, repeated doses of the polio vaccine were deemed crucial for all children under five.
It said that for this initiative, 42,161 trained polio workers including 32,387 mobile teams, 6,301 supervisors, 1,967 fixed teams, 1,342 transit teams, and 164 roaming teams had been deployed to ensure vaccination of each and every child.
Additionally 8,273 area in-charges had also been appointed to monitor the vaccination campaign. In order to ensure security of polio teams the government had deputed 54,000 police personnel.
