Mayor Rayana Bhagyalakshmi has called upon parents of children aged below five years to make use of the pulse polio immunisation drive to be conducted across the city on Sunday. Ms. Bhagyalakshmi along with Vijayawada Municipal Corporation Commissioner P. Ranjit Bhasha, Joint Collector L. Siva Shankar and Vijayawada Sub-Collector G.S.S. Praveen Chand flagged off a pulse polio awareness rally at Sub-Collectors office. The rally by VMC’s public health wing passed through M.G Road and ended at Thummalapalli Kalakshetram. On the occasion, Ms. Bhagyalakshmi said that there were 1,48,953 children aged between 0-5 years and they had to be administered polio immunisation drops.
She said arrangements were made at 378 polio immunisation camps set up across the city and 1,862 health workers and staff had been roped in for smooth conduct of the programme. Also, 30 transit centres would be set up to reach out to the children in busy centres of the city and four mobile teams were also set up, she said. Mr. Bhasha said in the past 13 years there were no polio cases reported and continuous immunisation programme kept polio at bay. After the polio campaign on Sunday, door to door teams would visit houses of beneficiaries for three days from Monday, he said.
District figure
Mr. Siva Shankar said there were 4.5 lakh children aged under five years in the district and 2,650 polio camps would be set up for the immunisation drive. District Immunisation Officer Dr. S. Sharmistha, VMC Chief Medical Officer of Health G. Geetha Bhai and others took part in the rally.
