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MIRPUR (AJK), Sep 01 (APP):In AJK’s densely populated lakeside Mirpur district, a four-day anti-polio campaign was launched on Monday after it was formally inaugurated here to eradicate the disease among the children.
District Bar Association President, Chaudhry Mahmood Hussain Plakvi Advocate, inaugurated the drive administering polio vaccine drops to children up to five years of age at the District Health Office, Mirpur.
District Health Officer, Dr Fida Hussain Raja, Deputy Medical Superintendent, Divisional Headquarters Teaching Hospital Mirpur, Dr Maria Zulfiqar, General Secretary District Bar Association, Fayyaz Ahmed Chaudhry Advocate, ADHO Dadial, Dr Shumaila Karan, senior Journalist, Zafar Iqbal Mughal and others also administered polio drops to under-5 years of aged children.
Additional Principal Medical Officer, Dr Fatima Yaqoob, District Information Officer, Muhammad Javed Malik, Assistant Coordinator National Program Dr. Faria Javed, Assistant Director Surveillance Muhammad Riaz, DSV Abdul Waheed, NIDs Focal Person District Mirpur, Noman Shahzad UCSP, Data Focal Person, Muhammad Ehsan, Storekeeper, Ghulam Rabbani, ASV Majid Iqbal, UCMOs, Area Supervisors and distinguished city and public representatives, representatives of electronic and print media, besides employees of the Public Health Department were also present on the occasion.
District Health Officer Mirpur, Dr Fida Hussain Raja, while giving a briefing regarding the campaign , said that the teams of the Public Health Department Mirpur district would go door to door in the entire district and administer polio drops to all children up to the age of five years.
He further said that it was not only the responsibility of the government or the Public Health Department to carry out the polio campaign as a national, religious and moral duty, but it was also imperative for every citizen and people belonging to all schools of thought to play a role in it so that no child below the age of five years was deprived of taking polio drops.
Dr Fida added that during the four-day campaign, Mirpur district had been divided into forty-nine union councils/wards and trained supervisors had been appointed to administer polio drops to children up to the age of five years in Mirpur district.
As per the instructions of WHO, to make the polio campaign successful, 2 Tehsil Supervisors, 35 Union Council Monitoring Officers and 103 Union Council Ward In-charges have been appointed to supervise the teams at the level of Municipal Corporation Mirpur, Municipal Committee Islamgarh, Chakswari and Municipal Committee Dadial, as well as twenty-seven Union Councils.
Under the supervision of these in-charges, 439 mobile teams and 41 fixed centers have been appointed at health centers to administer polio drops to 76,656 children up to the age of five years. Transit points have also been established at 14 different necessary places for children traveling with their parents.
The DHO appealed to the parents, nation-building institutions and private schools to cooperate with the mobile teams and fixed centers of the State Health Department, visiting homes and schools and administering polio vaccine drops to children up to the age of five.
He underlined that earlier, the polio campaign had always been very successful due to the dedication, hard work of the polio teams in the internal and external routes of Mirpur and in urban and rural areas, and the good strategy of the AJK Health Department, along with the cooperation of the public.
The DHO said that due to the successful strategy of the government’s State Health Department and the tireless work of the polio teams, no polio case had been reported in Azad Jammu and Kashmir during last 25 years.
“Without the cooperation of the public, the no anti-polio campaign can make a complete success,” he said, adding that to achieve this goal, we would have to fully cooperate with the polio teams of the State Health Department.
District Health Officer (DHO) Dr. Fida Hussain hoped to achieve the 100 percent target of the anti-polio drive in the district by utilizing the dedication and hard work of the polio teams, besides those at the fixed centers.