A coverage of 98.56 per cent was achieved in Coimbatore district in the first phase of the pulse polio immunisation programme on Sunday.
Of the targeted 3,39,871 lakh children in the age group of 0 to 5 years, 3,34,976 children have been covered, according to Deputy Director of Health Services R. Damodharan. Giving a break-up, he said that 1,94,957 children were covered in rural areas and 1,40,019 in urban areas. Pollachi Municipality had the distinction of achieving 105 per cent coverage. The Corporation administered polio drops to 98.9 per cent of the targeted 1,25,702 children.
According to a release, the civic body deployed 784 staff and set up 196 booths across the city. This figure did not include the 3,900 children covered at seven transit points and 89 children of migrant labourers.
The transit points are the Coimbatore Railway Junction, two bus stands in Gandhipuram and the ones on Mettupalayam Road, Singanallur, Ukkadam and Sathyamangalam Road.
The civic body began the immunisation drive with Mayor S.M. Velusamy administering the polio drops to children in the presence of Commissioner in-charge S. Sivarasu and Health Committee Chairperson S. Thamarai Selvi.
Monday onwards till Saturday, workers from the health wing would go on a door-to-door campaign to ensure that no child was left out of the immunisation drive. On Sunday, to immunise the children the Corporation had spent around 6,600 vials of vaccine.
At Coimbatore Medical College Hospital, where the immunisation was inaugurated by the Mayor in the presence of Resident Medical Officer P. Sivaprakasam, a total of 739 doses were administered.
Agriculture Minister S. Damodaran and Deputy Speaker of Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly Pollachi V. Jayaraman administered the drops at a function in Pollachi.
Collector M. Karunagaran said that 6,584 workers had been involved in this campaign in the district with booths established at Primary Health Centres, Government hospitals, noon meal centres, schools and other places.
Tirupur Staff Reporter adds
Of the 2,23,657 children enumerated in the district for the coverage under the polio immunisation programme, 1,57,885 were from rural localities and the remaining from hamlets coming under urban areas. To administer the polio drops, as many as 1,132 booths were set up across the district which included 44 mobile booths and 20 booths in railway stations as well as bus stands to cater to the people on travel mode. A total of 3.8 lakh doses of the vaccine were stacked in the district for the campaign this time.
Deputy Director of Public Health and Preventive Medicine N. Ragupathy said that there would be door-to-door campaign for three days from Monday to administer the drops to the children left out on Sunday.
Earlier, Minister for Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments M.S.M.Anandan inaugurated the campaign at District Headquarters hospital. Collector G. Govindaraj and Mayor Visalakshi Appukutty among others were present.
