VACCINES and domestic immunisation policy form a critical component of a nation

ON January 15, the production licences of three vaccine-manufacturing public enterprises under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoH&FW) were cancelled, and they were ordered to suspend production forthwith by the then Drug Controller General of India (DCGI), M.

: With the detection of polio virus prevalence in the environs of a couple of towns, health workers in the city will undertake their polio eradication efforts during a three-day immunisation drive being launched across the province on Tuesday.

Researchers have uncovered evidence to support what mothers have long been saying: immune system needs food to function properly. Working on mice, University of Chicago researchers found that restricting their subjects' diet by 30% decreased the amount of available B cells, which produce antibodies and maintain immune memory.

The Expanded Programme on Immunisation (EPI), Sindh, has decided to refocus the routine immunisation efforts to realise the goal of making Sindh a polio free province.

Taking notice of resistance by some parents to immunisation of their children against polio, District Nazim Kanwar Naveed Jamil has constituted a three-member committee to ensure that polio drops are administered to all children up to five years of age throughout the district during a three-day anti-polio campaign beginning on Tuesday. The committee comprises the DCO, the EDO health (focal person) and the SP City. The decision was taken at a meeting held at the district nazim secretariat here to finalise arrangements for the campaign. Speaking on the occasion, Mr Jamil said that due to the attitude of some parents who were resisting the administration of anti-polio drops, 297,000 children in the district could not be placed at risk. He said that at the request of the district government, prayer leaders, public representatives and social workers had tried to persuade such parents to get their children immunised but some of them were still adamant. The district nazim said that such a state of affairs could not be tolerated. He directed the EDO Health to prepare a list of the resisting parents and said that come what may, their children would be administered anti-polio drops. He directed the officers of the health department to collect information about such parents. He directed the employees of all the departments of the district government not only to ensure that their own children were administered anti-polio drops but the children of their neighbours were also immunised. He directed the EDO health to include maximum number of female workers in the anti-polio teams to ensure success of the campaign. He appealed to social activists, civil servants and public representatives to make sure that each and every locality was visited by health workers during the drive. He said that even after the latest round of the campaign, the drive would continue in all the hospitals and anti-polio centres, specially at main entrance of the district, would be activated.