The district health authorities need to take full ownership of the polio eradication campaigns and ensure that the upcoming January national inoculation drive against polio is a success”, instructed head of the polio programme in Punjab and Emergency Operations Centre Coordinator Khizer Afzaal.
He was talking to the Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) and District Health Officers (DHOs) of 41 districts of Punjab during a meeting held to review preparations regarding the upcoming national polio eradication campaign. All the CEOs and DHOs joined the meeting via video link.
“I urge you to devise a training monitoring plan and personally monitor the ongoing trainings. Quality of trainings needs to be up to the mark”, instructed the EOC head.
“Coverage of children belonging to priority populations is top priority. Teams fluent in local languages need to be deployed in priority community areas to ensure that there is no language barrier”, stressed the EOC head Khizer Afzaal.
The EOC coordinator urged the district health administrations to ensure data quality so that “issues could be identified and rectified timely”. He called on the districts to ensure that polio workers from same area are selected for polio campaigns.
Talking to the participants the Punjab polio programme head stressed that there was nothing more important during the polio campaigns. “Districts need to pay full attention to vaccination of children during the SIAs. Therefore, a monitoring plan needs to be devised with full participation from high-ups”, instructed the EOC coordinator.
Khizer issued strict instructions about the use of vaccine and urged the CEOs and DHOs to ensure that polio vaccine was used judiciously. “Districts need to develop an analysis of the vaccine usage with trends so that there is a permanent check on the vaccine leftovers”, he underlined.
Khizer Afzaal instructed the district health administrations to ensure safety and well-being of polio workers. “The National Emergency Operations Centre has started an initiative to distribute monetary relief among polio workers. The rehabilitation assistance provided to the districts needs to be distributed to the workers on time”, directed the EOC head.
