KARACHI: The provincial government launched on Tuesday a massive door-to-door Covid-19 vaccination campaign targeting each and every household in the province.

Part of a national initiative, the 14-day campaign targets a total of 18,460,137 eligible citizens above the age of 12 years. Of them, 12,748,123 citizens will receive their first dose while another 5,712,014 citizens will receive their second dose.

“The Covid-19 pandemic is continuing with new variants emerging and the rapid spread of the virus in the last few weeks requires a speed up of immunization activities to boost the immunity of the population,” said Health Minister Dr Azra Fazal Pechuho at a press here.

Sharing the campaign’s details, she said the Expanded Programme for Immunization (EPI), Sindh, was deploying 10,988 skilled persons/social mobilisers across the province to reach the masses with the first and second dose of the Covid-19 vaccine.

“A total of 51,000 Covid-19 cases have been reported in Sindh in the last 30 days. The vaccines will help citizens to be protected against the virus and severe illness. At the moment, 37 per cent of Sindh’s eligible population (13.907 million) are fully vaccinated while another 18.810m have received the first dose of their Covid-19 vaccine,” she said.

This campaign would help increase coverage while citizens would have the opportunity to be vaccinated at their own doorstep, she added.

Asked about how the staff would handle cases of vaccine’s side effects, the minister explained that the government was deploying mobile units that the vaccinators would immediately call to address cases of side effects.

About the delay in salaries to staff deputed at the mega immunisation unit at Expo Centre, she said the department was in touch with finance officials and the salaries would be released in a day or two. “I must tell you here that mega Covid-19 immunisation centres are no longer important for us as people are not going there anymore. This is why we are engaging the staff at these centres in the door-to-door campaign.”

On the reports of using expired Covid-19 vaccines in Khairpur, she said the investigation was continuing and the district health officer concerned would be suspended as he was responsible to maintain and release vaccine stocks.

“He shouldn’t have released the vaccines, if they had expired,” she said.

Published in Dawn, February 2nd, 2022