Mobilink has finally sent the first of the many million text messages it would be sending out ahead of the upcoming polio round; the purpose is to educate parents about the presence of the virus in their locality and the need to vaccinate their children.“After crosschecking with some officials, both in Karachi and Mobilink, we can now confirm that yesterday evening (Thursday), Mobilink sent almost 1.3 million text messages to its customer base in Karachi, whereas today (Saturday) Peshawar and other parts of NWFP would be targeted with almost similar number of text messages,” said an official working for the Expanded Programme on Immunisation.
After the National Highways and Motorway Police and the National Database and Registration Authority, Mobilink is the third organization to have joined the fight against polio. A list of 48 high-risk districts for poliovirus circulation was provided to Mobilink by the health authorities; these include NWFP, Southern Punjab including Multan and Bahalwalpur, and many districts of Sindh including Karachi. “We were told that the customer base of Mobilink is too big for text messages to be sent to each and every subscriber as it would take more than a month to complete the whole process,” said the official.
It is also learnt that the expanding partnership network for polio control will have a new entrant in the April round as the Islamabad Traffic Police (ITP) is all set to strengthen the country’s largest public health initiative by establishing 10 posts for immunization against the crippling virus.
Titled ‘The ITP Polio Checkpoints,’ these posts will be established at busy traffic signals and routes to reach out to children traveling with their parents, said an official.
The checkpoints will be established for the upcoming special immunisation round scheduled for April 13 to 15.
The sites selected for the checkpoints are PTCL Chowk on 9th Avenue, Faisal Chowk on Margalla Road, F-7 College Road, Jinnah Super Market, F-6 Flower Market, F-6 Kulsoom Plaza Chowk, F-10 McDonald’s roundabout, Peshawar Morr Chowk, I-8 Garden Avenue, Expressway and Chak Shahzad roundabout.
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