KARACHI, Aug 23: Kicking off the 47th round of National Immunization Days (NIDs), adviser on health to the chief minister declared that he did not believe much in paper work. He was interested more in finding out for himself about the ground realities.

Speaking at a ceremony at the Sindh Government Services Hospital on Monday, Faisal Malik called for close cooperation between the health department and international agencies like the WHO and Unicef.

He said the WHO should have direct contact with the health department and must stop dealing with NGOs of its choice only which weakened the anti-polio initiative.

He said complaints against the effectiveness of the anti-polio drops should be looked into. Controversial and sensational disclosures made on the eve of the NIDs against the vaccine not only brought a bad name to the health department but also damaged the initiative itself.

The health adviser was of the opinion that the effectiveness, or otherwise, of the vaccines should be determined much before the launch of the NIDs. He said the WHO and donor agencies spent considerable amount of money on the training of vaccinators and their supervisors.

He said in the NIDs to be observed from Tuesday to Thursday 6.2 million children were to be vaccinated against polio which was untreatable. For this purpose some 8,000 teams had been formulated in which there were 32,000 vaccinators and 597 area supervisors.

He asked the health department officials to ensure that in the NIDs every home was visited and every child under five vaccinated. He said that the EDOs be directed to compile statistics about the number of children vaccinated so far, adds PPI.

Faisal Malik expressed concern over complaints of substandard polio vaccination. Is was a matter of concern as a huge amount had been spent on holding of training workshops by the health department and WHO.

Representatives of WHO Dr. Azmodai and Dr. Asif Aslam, secretary health Dr Ashiq Hussain Memon, Director General Sindh Health Dr Hussain Bux Memon and Dr Naheed Jamali also spoke.

ORANGI: Sindh minister for planning and development Syed Shoaib Ahmed Bukhari on Monday inaugurated a three-day polio campaign in Orangi Town and administered polio vaccines among children.