More Than 38 Lakh Children Receive Polio Drops

The pulse polio immunisation program for children up to five years of age was held across Telangana today.

50 lakh doses of the vaccine were supplied to the state's districts for the same, and close to 38,319,07 children were given the vaccine at 23,331 polio booths.

The health department had employed the services of 8,589 Auxiliary Nurse Midwives, 2,333 route supervisors and 27,040 Accredited Social Health Activists.

Apart from this, 877 mobile teams had been deployed at 877 transit points to administer the vaccine.

Speaking at the inauguration of the Shamirpet polio eradication drive, Health Minister Etala Rajender said, "We have organised a massive vaccination drive to make Telangana a polio-free state. We will also be conducting a mop-up polio drive over the next few days to ensure that those children who are unable to take the vaccine today can still get access to it later."

(The mop-up house-to-house drive will reportedly be conducted on February 1 and 2.)

Telangana Environment Minister A Indrakaran Reddy also participated in the drive.

Speaking after inaugurating the drive at a bus stand in Nirmal district, he called upon the people of the state to join hands with the TRS government to build a polio-free society in Telangana.

Reddy also administered the polio drops on some children present at the bus stand.

The minister then expressed his appreciation for the state government for having set up vaccination booths at all the major bus stands and other crowded locations in the state.

He reiterated his appeal to the parents of children aged below 5 to ensure that their wards were vaccinated against the polio virus.

Later, Reddy visited the cargo transportation centre being run by TSRTC on the bus stand premises, and interacted with the centre's staff.