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Tamil Nadu
70 lakh children given polio drops
| Two lakh health workers and volunteers supervised the drive |
PREVENTIVE MEASURE: Chief Minister M.Karunanidhi administering polio drops to a child at his residence in Chennai on Sunday.
CHENNAI: The Pulse Polio Immunisation (PPI) campaign reached out to an estimated 70 lakh infants in the 0-5 age group on Sunday across Tamil Nadu, which seeks to extend its polio-free run beyond a fourth successive year.
About two lakh health workers and volunteers supervised the PPI drive that took place between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. at an estimated 40,400 booths.
At many places of transit such as railways stations and bus termini, immunisation booths functioned round-the-clock.
In Chennai, Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi administered the polio drops to a group of infants at his Gopalapuram residence. The children, cuddled in the arms of their mothers, also took home gift kits as reward for swallowing two drops of the bitter medicine.
Health Minister M.R.K. Panneerselvam, Health Secretary V. K. Subburaj and other officials were also present.
The success of the PPI that has made Tamil Nadu a frontrunner in immunisation coverage owes chiefly to the diligence of volunteers and widespread people’s participation.
Sunday’s schedule administering live attenuated oral polio vaccines focused on intensive coverage of migrant children from States such as Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, which together, accounted for almost 95 per cent of the cases reported in India, health officials said.
That a majority of the 590 cases reported in the country originated in UP and Bihar holds great import for Tamil Nadu where a large number of migrant workers from these States work on civil construction sites and Railway development projects.
“We have enlisted around 22,000 migrant infants for administering the preventive vaccines,” a health department official said. Mobile teams were also pressed into service to reach out to remote areas. The PPI aims at protecting children from developing infection even if they do come into contact with the polio virus that is transmitted through faecal-contaminated water or food. In a non-immunised child, the virus could rapidly replicate in the intestine and lead to the crippling condition of poliomyelitis.
According to immunisation experts, India was one of the 11 countries where the polio infection was reported during 2007. It is also one of the endemic zones for polio transmission along with Nigeria, Afghanistan and Pakistan, and accounted for nearly 50 per cent of the 925 cases reported globally last year.
The next round of PPI is scheduled for February 10.
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