With an aim to deliver a competent deworming treatment for all children in Jharkhand in order to improve the overall health and ensure cognitive development, National Deworming Day (NDD) programme will be organised on February 8 across 17 districts.
Department of Health and Family Welfare in collaboration with Department of Women, Child Development and Social Welfare including Department of Human Resource Development will roll out the programme covering around 95 lakh children.
For the first time, students of intermediate colleges including technical colleges enrolled in first year have been also included in the campaign that aims to eradicate intestinal worm infections in children falling in the age group 1 to 19 years. According to a survey report, over 43 percent children here in Jharkhand is infected with soil-transmitted helminth infections which includes hookworm, roundworm and whipworm.
Additional Chief Secretary, Sudhir Tripathy during the press meet on Monday said, “A total of 33,588 teachers and 24,707 anganwadi workers will administer the drug (albendazole) among the children. Children in the age group 1-2 years will be given half a tablet while children in the age group 2-3 years and 3-9 years will be given 1 tablet. The department will organise mop-up day on February 15 for those children who have been left out due to different reasons.”
“In February, Khunti, Simdega, Hazaribagh, Dhanbad, Giridih, Koderma, Palamau, latehar, Garhwa, West Singhbhum, Saraikela, Kharsawan, Dumka, Deogarh, Godda, Pakur, Sahibganj and Jamtara will be covered while the remaining 7 districts will be covered later as the left-out districts register Filariasis disease cases and accordingly the drive will be conducted there,” Tripathi further added.
As many as 1.03 crore children were dewormed in August 2017. NDD is a pan-India public health programme under the aegis of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, GoI in collaboration with six ministries.
Also, following the World Health Organization (WHO) report which suggests that more than 22 crore children in the age group 5-14 years are at risk while India is one country with the highest burden of worm, NDD programme has been designed to reach all children in different States irrespective of their socio-economic backgrounds.
The programme is conducted with the technical assistance from the WHO, National Centre for Disease Control and Evidence Action. All resource personnel have been imparted training on the guidelines issued by Ministry of Health and Family Welfare inclusive plan while comprehensive adverse event protocols have been put in place to meet any emergency situation.