NEW DELHI: More than 17 crore children of less than 5 years will be given polio drops as part of the drive of Government of India to sustain polio eradication from the country.
President of India, Ram Nath Kovind, launched the Pulse Polio programme for 2018 by administering polio drops to children less than five years old, at the Rahstrapati Bhawan today.
The President administered the polio drops on the eve of the National Immunization Day, which is observed tomorrow.
Union Minister for Health & Family Welfare J P Nadda said, “We need to remain vigilant and maintain the population immunity and sensitive surveillance till global polio eradication happens as poliovirus is still circulating in other parts of the world which may reinfect us.”
In order to mitigate the risk of poliovirus importation, the immunity against polio infection is maintained through National and Sub-National Polio rounds along with sustained high quality polio surveillance.
To provide additional protection to our children, Government of India has also introduced the injectable Inactivated Polio Vaccine (IPV) into its routine immunization program.
Nadda informed, “To further strengthen and accomplish our goals we have launched Mission Indradhanush and encouraged by its success, we have recently intensified the mission in October, 2017 to achieve more than 90% full immunization coverage by 2018.”
