PESHAWAR, Aug 19: The federal government has allocated Rs337 million under the Global Alliance for Vaccination and Immunization programme for the NWFP as grant-in-aid to strengthen its expanded programme on immunization (EPI), health officials said.

The government has received the assistance from the US Microsoft giant, Bill Gates, who has pledged billions of dollars for health care projects in the third world countries.

Pakistan has qualified to receive the grant for its EPI programme.

The NWFP would receive the amount in the form of logistic support, vaccines and equipment for five years beginning from the year 2003 to strengthen its vaccination programme.

Meanwhile, the PC-1 for the EPI has also been improved by the provincial finance department.

The provincial EPI department had claimed that it had been working with 800 EPI technicians since the programme was launched in the eighties whereas the population constantly increasing.

The EPI department is required to make arrangements for the vaccination of 17 per cent of the population, because the population of the children below the age of five years was 17 per cent.

The department, according to the PC-1 would appoint 157 new technicians to cope with the increasing workload.

The main focus would be laid on controlling polio, said an official, adding that so far 12 cases of polio had been reported during the current year.

Giving details, he said that four cases were detected in Lakki Marwat and three in Swat and one each in Lower Dir, Upper Dir, Mardan, Charsadda and Khyber Agency.