New Delhi, June 18: The first Sub-National Immunization Day for 2022 to administer polio vaccine will be held on June 19 in 11 states and Union Territories targeting around 3.9 crore children aged below 5 years.
The campaign will be held in Bihar, Chandigarh, Delhi, Gujarat, Haryana, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Punjab, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, and West Bengal, the Union Health Ministry said.
India, along with 10 other countries in the South-East Asia Region of WHO, was certified polio-free on March 27, 2014. The last case of polio in the country was reported on January 13, 2011, from Howrah in West Bengal.
Globally, polio is still endemic in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the health ministry said in a statement.
“During this polio campaign, around 3.9 crore children less than 5 years of age are targeted to be given polio drops through the booth, house-to-house, mobile and transit teams.
“To provide additional protection to children, the Government of India has also introduced the injectable inactivated poliovirus vaccine into its routine immunization programme,” it said.
Though India has been certified polio-free, the risk of wild poliovirus importation or the emergence of vaccine-derived polioviruses persists until global eradication. This highlights the need for maintaining high population immunity and sensitive surveillance, the ministry said.
While India is making efforts to protect its children from more and more vaccine-preventable diseases by introducing additional vaccines under the Universal Immunization Program, it is important that all vaccines reach every last child in the country, it said.
The lessons learnt and systems created under the National Polio Programme are being used to strengthen routine immunisation and achieve more than 90 per cent full-immunization coverage, the ministry said.
State governments and organisations like WHO, UNICEF, Rotary International and other partners have played a significant role not only in polio eradication but also in improving routine immunization initiatives. (PTI)
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