The five-day national polio eradication drive will get underway from all over Punjab from Monday, said Minister for Primary and Secondary Healthcare Khawaja Imran Nazir. The provincial emergency operations centre has constituted over 44,000 teams who will go door to door to vaccinate over 18.5 million under-five children all over the province. Punjab has had no polio case in 2016 but with the beginning of 2017 a child was paralyzed by the virus in Lodhran, leaving the family devastated. Five polio cases have been reported in Pakistan this year from Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Gilgit-Baltistan, Sindh and Balochistan respectively.
The Punjab government wants to build immunity of every child before the polio high-risk season that starts in May next year, he said, adding: "Reaching and vaccinating every child is absolutely critical in order to ensure that no more child suffers from the incurable disease." Secretary Primary and Secondary Healthcare Ali Jan Khan said province of Punjab will be implementing the campaign more aggressively in Rawalpindi, Lahore and South Punjab.
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