KARACHI, Sept 22: The city of Karachi has been declared “polio free”. The Sindh Health Department with the support of the World Health Organization has been able to control polio cases by 97 per cent till last year while no new polio case has been registered in Karachi this year.

A meeting chaired by the Sindh chief secretary was informed on Thursday that all measures were being adopted to eradicate polio from the Sindh province.

The meeting among others was also attended by the WHO Representative, Dr Azmoudeh, the UNICEF’s, Dr Laila Rizvi, EDO Health Dr Khalid Shaikh, DIG Operations Mushtaq Shah, DO Health Dr Raza Ali, town municipal officers, EDO Education and other officials.

The meeting decided that to raise public awareness about the severity of the disease and with the urgency of attaining zero prevalence of the polio virus, a massive campaign would be launched in close collaboration with the print and electronic media.

It was also agreed that mobile/cellphone companies, transport organisations would also be engaged so that simple messages could be displayed intervals enabling people to realise the importance of immunisation against polio.

The participants explicitly discussed arrangements being made for the National Immunisation Campaign scheduled from Sept 27 to 29.

The DCO and Caretaker of city government, Fazalur Rehman, also appealed to parents to ensure immunisation of their children below five years of age against polio.—APP