Chandigarh: Fabrury 23:
In connection with the three day Pulse Polio Campaign-2022, an important meeting of the State Task Force was held in Chandigarh under the chairmanship of Principal Secretary Health and Family Welfare Mr. Raj Kamal Chaudhary through online medium. In this meeting, M.D. NHM Kumar Rahul, MD p.h.s.c. Bhupinder Singh, Director Health and Family Welfare Dr.G.B. Singh, Director Health Services (f.w.) Dr.O.P. Gojra, Assistant Director Dr. Balwinder Kaur,Dr.Srinivasan, Dr. Vikram from World Health Organization all Civil Surgeons of Punjab State, Immunization Officers, representatives of various departments also participated.
Giving more information about the Pulse Polio Campaign, Principal Secretary Mr. Chaudhary said that this campaign would be started in the state from 27th February and would be completed on 1st March. He said that 31,08,660 children of 0 to 5 years of age would be given polio drops by the health workers across the state. Mr. Chaudhary said that on the first day of the campaign 14,468 polio booths would be set up across the state and on the second day 26,741 teams would go door to door to administer these drops to the children.
Apart from this Principal Secretary Mr. Chaudhary said that 848 mobile teams and 764 transit teams have been formed in the state to administer polio drops to the children living in the high risk areas. 4379 ANMS, 19573 Asha Workers, 21201 Anganwadi Workers and about 10145 Volunteers have been deployed to make this campaign a success and 3180 Supervisors have been deployed to monitor them.
On this occasion the Director of Health Department (fw) Dr. O.P. Gojra said that 8436 high risk areas have been identified by the department out of which 4297 slums, 279 construction sites, 775 migration sites, 2064 brick kilns and 1021 other sites would be provided polio drops by the personnel of the department.
Dr. O.P. Gojra said that senior officers of the Director’s Office have been appointed as Observers to monitor the Pulse Polio Campaign in the state which would monitor the campaign for three days in different districts of the state and ensure that no eligible child should be deprived of polio drops.
Apart from this the Director Health said that Mission Inder Dhanush was also discussed during the meeting of the task force and the department aimed complete immunization of children below two years of age and pregnant women under Mission Inder Dhanush in three phases from March to May. He said that the vaccination process has been affected due to Covid but the immunization drive would be intensified in the coming days under Mission Inder Dhanush. He said that although the Government of India had initially directed to launch this special campaign in six districts of Punjab but the campaign was directed to be carried out in all the districts of Punjab by the Principal Secretary.
The Principal Secretary Health Mr. Chaudhary and the Director Health also directed the Mass Media Wing of the Department to spread awareness about Pulse Polio and Inderdhanush Campaign.
