Anti-polio drops to be administered today

January 19, 2001
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Kathmandu, Jan. 19 : Anti-polio drops is to be administered to some 3.9 million children below five across the country in the second phase of the fifth national immunization day tomorrow.

The first dose was administered in the first phase of the programme on Dec. 9 last year.

The programme is being organised in Nepal for the past four years as part of the global campaign to wipe out polio from the world.

As it is essential to immunise all children below five years of age in order to eradicate polio disease and as repeated administration of polio drops would do no harm, all parents have been requested to administer polio drops to their children.

The immunisation programme is said to cost around 170 million rupees, Rs 8.485 million of which is to be met by His Majesty’s Government and the remaining with the assistance in cash and kind from the World Health Organisation (WHO), UNICEF, C.D.C. Atlanta, Rotary International, Government of Japan and Government of South Korea.

Under the fourth national immunisation day programme, polio vaccine was given to around 95 per cent of children below five years of age in the country.

To ensure greater success of the immunisation day programme this year, various additional committees have been constituted at the local level, which will despatch search teams the day after the immunization to find out if any children have been missed out.

In 1998, 350,000 new polio cases were recorded in the world which led to the organising of various polio eradication programmes throughout the world. This resulted in a decline in the number to 6659 in 1999.

The World Health Organisation has aimed to free the world from polio after 2010.

Polio is still a big health problem in Asia and Africa, and India alone accounts for 80 per cent of the polio cases in the world. In this context, Nepal is still prone to the disease.

South Asian countries Bhutan, Sri Lanka and Maldives have already become polio-free countries.