LAHORE: Begum Samina Arif Alvi, wife of President Dr Arif Alvi, Tuesday inaugurated the ‘National polio eradication campaign’ by administering vaccine to children under five years of age here at Governor’s House.
World Health Organisation (WHO) Punjab team leader Dr Abidi, WHO representative in Pakistan Dr Palitha Mahipala, National Operation Centre official Dr Shahzad Baig, UNICEF chief of polio programme Hamish Young and UNICEF polio team leader in Punjab Fatima Fraz were also present.
UNICEF Punjab Polio Head Sundas Irshad said that during the five-day campaign, 16.9 million children would be vaccinated against polio, adding that more than 156, 000 polio workers had been deployed to make the campaign a success.
She said that the government had succeeded in achieving positive results against polio, adding that no any single case of polio had been reported in Punjab this year.
She said that environmental samples were predicting an end to polio soon, adding that all the environmental samples obtained from Punjab during the last six months were negative.
She said that more efforts were needed for complete eradication of polio, adding that efforts would continue for completely eradication of the virus.
She urged the people and parents to make sure that not a single child is left out of the vaccine.