HYDERABAD, May 23: The chairperson of President’s oversight committee for polio eradication, Dr Azra Fazal Pechuhu, directed officers to ensure vaccination in every government health facility and advised them to concentrate on routine immunisation so that the menace of polio could be eradicated.

Dr Pechuhu was presiding over a meeting of the polio eradication committee for Hyderabad division at the Old Zila Nazim Secretariat on Thursday. Hyderabad commissioner Dr Riaz Ahmed Memon and other government officers briefed the meeting about efforts made for eradicating polio. World Bank consultants Tadesso Gassaye and Mesfin Haile, Mustafa Kamal of the People’s Primary Health Initiative and Dr Durenaz of the Expanded Programme of Immunisation were also present at the meeting besides Unicef and civil society representatives. During the meeting, she directed deputy commissioners to set up a control room for eradicating polio and said that data regarding polio and refusal cases must be provided here. Expressing displeasure over refusal of parents to vaccinate their children, she said that it was not a good sign. She advised putting in place a micro plan to attend to children and directed deputy commissioners to ensure that the micro plan reached every child.

She directed that a mobilisation campaign should be launched with participation of the local community to convince parents who were refusing to get their children vaccinated for polio. Talking to deputy commissioners and health officers, Dr Pechuhu stressed making the three-day polio campaign beginning from May 27 successful. It was a crucial task and should be dealt with serious efforts, she stressed.

Dr Pechuhu instructed health officers to revamp the anti-polio campaign keeping in mind the population influx and migration in several areas. She emphasised that the micro polio plan must ensure that every child younger than five years received polio drops. She said that the lady health workers and lady health supervisors must achieve their targets and asked health officers to monitor their performances.

The meeting expressed satisfaction over the decline in measles cases in Sindh, supposedly due to immunisation coverage by provincial health management.

It was emphasised that vaccination of newborns must be vigilantly monitored, and 99 per cent coverage in this regars should be reached in every union council.

Dr Pechuhu said that the government was developing a multi-dimensional strategy for polio eradication. She said that contaminated water, unhygienic living conditions and poor sanitation in residential areas were the factors contributing in the spread of polio.

She directed deputy commissioners and local government officers to prepare and submit a plan for supplying safe drinking water and improving sanitation to avoid waterborne diseases.