AsiaNet-Pakistan Premier Editorial Content and Press Release Distribution Service
Islamabad, October 13, 2012 (PPI-OT): As the next round of national immunization for Polio begins on Monday, President Asif Ali Zardari will launch the three day campaign here on Monday. Cabinet Ministers, all Governors, Chief Secretaries, Secretaries of Health, Parliamentarians and Representatives of international partner organizations will also participate in the event.
The President will make a special appeal to people from all walks of life to support the cause and contribute to the goal of making Pakistan free of the scourge. He will also be telling the international community that despite challenges Pakistan is making an all out effort and there is a progressive improvement in campaign performance with a sharp decline in the number of polio cases and districts with polio virus circulation.
Pakistan to date has reported 44 cases this year as compared to 136 in the same period last year whereas the number of infected districts has reduced from 41 last year to 26 this year. Of the 44 cases reported this year 33 cases are from FATA and Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa alone highlighting that the virus is mostly restricted to these areas and the challenge of inaccessibility and security needs to be met with consistent effort.
According to the Prime Minister’s Polio Monitoring Cell special arrangements to target each and every household have been made to ensure no child is missed during the upcoming campaign.
A total of 77,168 vaccination teams will go house to house across the country to vaccinate all the children aged less than 5 years. Moreover, 5,824 transit teams will also function on the busy market places, bus stations, airports, railway stations and other busy routes and points to vaccinate children out of the house and on the move. An additional 9,679 vaccination fixed teams will also work in the health facilities and clinics. All Vaccination teams will be supervised by a total of 16,750 area supervisors and 3,159 Union Council in-charges and Medical Officers.
22 special border vaccination posts have been established at the Pak-Afghan and Pak-China borders to vaccinate all children under 5 years of age entering or exiting from these border points.
The Prime Minister’s Polio Monitoring and Co-ordination Cell will be overseeing the nation-wide campaign to ensure that targets set the National Task Force led by the Prime Minister are met. In the provinces, the Chief Ministers are leading the effort whereas Governor Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa is personally supervising the campaign in FATA.
For more information, contact:
Haji Ahmed Malik
Principal Information Officer
Press Information Department (PID)
Tel: +9251 925 2323 and +9251 925 2324
Fax: +9251 925 2325 and +9251 925 2326
Email: piopid@gmail.com