LAHORE: The Punjab health department has decided to send special teams for administering polio drops to the children who are temporarily residing in other provinces, ARY News reported on Tuesday.
The Primary and Secondary Healthcare department issued directives to the administration for constituting teams for all high-risk districts including Dera Ghazi Khan.
The department’s secretary Muhammad Usman said that the children temporarily residing in other provinces were usually left out to get administered by polio drops. He said that special teams will be sent for vaccinating the children in other provinces.
Usman announced the provision of all facilities to the special teams for travelling to other provinces during the anti-polio drive. He directed vaccinators to travel as far as they could go to reach out to the children.
Read: Nationwide anti-polio drive to kick-off from August 13
He also detailed that the provincial health authorities were recruiting more vaccinators for ensuring the administration of vaccines to curb polio and other diseases. The secretary added that more than 3,000 vaccinators were already working under the health department, whereas, 2,000 more workers will be recruited.
The federal government decided to launch the anti-polio immunisation campaign in the country ahead of the month of Muharram from August 13 over security reasons. “Three-day campaign will be launched in most of the districts,” they said adding that anti-polio immunization drive will last for five days in Karachi, Peshawar, Khyber and Quetta blocks.
Overall 34.4 million children would be administered polio drops during the campaign, they said adding 225,000 polio workers will take part in the drive.
Read: Another polio case surfaces in Balochistan
The campaign will begin on August 13 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province, where 4.56 million children would be administered polio drops during the drive.
The polio immunisation drive would be launched in Punjab and Sindh province on August 15, covering 9.26 million children in 41 districts of Sindh and 17.86 million children in 33 districts of the Punjab province.
The anti-polio campaign will begin on 17 August in Balochistan and AJK, covering 2.1 million children in 25 districts of the former area.
The sources said that strict coronavirus SOPs would be followed during the anti-polio campaign as workers have been provided with adequate training for the purpose.
Moreover, the sources in the health ministry said that vitamin A drops will also be administered during the immunisation campaign to the children between the age of six months to six years.
