COVID-19 vaccination campaign to begin on February 01

KARACHI: The provincial expanded programme on immunisation under the guidance of the Sindh Health Department and, with the support of NCOC, would launch a door-to-door COVID-19 vaccination campaign. 

According to the reports, the campaign would be launched from February 01 to 14th, 2022, to enhance vaccination coverage and to ensure that citizens are protected from the COVID-19.

The COVID pandemic is still on, with new variants emerging. The virus's rapid spread in the last few weeks requires a speedup of immunisation activities to boost the population's immunity.

The total target for this campaign is 12,748,123 citizens above 12 years of age who will receive their first dose, while another 5,712,014 citizens will receive their second dose of the vaccine; this makes a total target of 18,460,137.

EPI Sindh is deploying 10,988 Skilled Persons/Social Mobilizers across the province to reach the masses with the first and second dose of the COVID vaccine, and 1134 UCMOs will supervise them. The vaccines available for this campaign include 180,495 doses of Sputnik, 354,652 doses of Moderna, 2,201,759 doses of Pfizer, 676,641 doses of Sinopharm, 2,131,573 doses of Sinovac and 474,875 doses of AstraZeneca. 

As per the sources, this campaign was the need of the hour as Sindh had reported 51000 cases of COVID-19 in the last 30 days. The vaccines would help citizens to be protected against the virus and severe illness. At the moment, 37 per cent of Sindh's eligible population, 13.907 million citizens, were fully vaccinated while another 18.810 million had received the first dose of their COVID vaccines. This campaign would further help increase coverage while citizens would have the opportunity to be vaccinated at their own doorsteps.