PESHAWAR: The national campaign to give supplementary immunisation to children against measles will start from October 15 throughout the country. The 12- day campaign will cover all children between the age of nine months and five years.

Programme manager of Expanded Programme on Immunisation, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Dr Akram Shah, said this on Wednesday while talking to representatives of various civil society organisations (CSOs) at a meeting. He briefed the 19 CSOs on the support expected in making the campaign a success in underserved and high-risk areas, especially for social mobilisation and demand promotion activities during the campaign in hard to reach areas and urban slums where government facilities and reach were minimal.

According to a statement issued here, the details were shared during the meeting titled “engagement of CSOs in strengthening essential immunisation and support during measles campaign” which was organised by EPI, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, at the polio emergency cell.

The objective of the meeting was to strengthen engagement between EPI and CSOs working in the province for improving coverage of essential immunisation. The participants were briefed on the number of target children, age group, duration and magnitude of the campaign.

It was decided that the programme would identify locations of underserved areas that could be a district or a union council and demarcate the location on the map where CSOs support could contribute tangibly to success of the measles campaign.

Published in Dawn, September 20th, 2018