The Hindu : Anti-typhoid drive on the anvil

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Feb 05, 2004

New Delhi

New Delhi

Anti-typhoid drive on the anvil

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI, FEB. 4. The Delhi Government is all set to launch its new anti-typhoid campaign on the lines of the pulse polio immunisation programme. Elated with the success of its pulse polio campaign, the Government in its latest project is hoping to target about one lakh children in the age group of one to five years.

The campaign, which is to begin in March, will be the first of its kind in the country and the vaccine will be made available to the public from State Government hospitals. It will then be distributed from various dispensaries, Central Government hospitals, and even private hospitals in the Capital.

"The vaccine will be administered to children between the ages of one to five and we hope to target approximately one lakh children under the programme. The typhoid fever is caused by enteric pathogen, Salmonella typhoid and spreads by the faecal-oral route. It is more prevalent in areas having poor sanitation facilities. Inadequate food hygiene can also cause typhoid. Along with the vaccination the state government will also try to spread awareness about the ailment," said the Delhi Minister, Yoganand Shastri, while providing details about the project.

Meanwhile, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO) figures, annually 16 million cases of typhoid are reported from all over the world of which approximately 6,00,000 die because of the ailment and about 70 per cent of the deaths are reported from Asia.

The Delhi Government meanwhile has already completed six phases of the eradication of Motiabind through the Motiabind Mukti Abhiyan (MMA). The seventh phase of MMA was planned in the month of October but could not be conducted because of elections.

The same is now proposed to be launched on March 9 and 10 and will be covered with the co-operation of various agencies including Municipal Corporation of Delhi, Central Government Health Services and Employees State Insurance Corporation (ESIC) etc. The state health department will be monitoring functions of the participating agencies for activities including identification of the centres, provide necessary inputs to run the screening centres, identification of the nodal officers and further helping in the distributing the IEC material and information.

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