Second phase of vaccination programme launched

New Delhi: In a bid to ensure that children left out of routine immunization drive get vaccinated, the union health ministry on Monday launched the second part of Mission Indradhanush, its flagship vaccination programme.

Launching the second phase, union Health Minister J.P. Nadda assured all support to the states for achieving targets of full immunization under the mission.

"We aim to achieve more than 90 percent full immunization in the country by 2020 under Mission Indradhanush," he said, exhorting them to leave no stone unturned to ensure that the left-out and missed-out children of the routine immunization programme in the country are covered.

Nadda also interacted with health ministers and health secretaries of various states through video conferencing and inquired about preparations to implement the second phase of this initiative, an official release said here.

As part of the second phase of the Mission Indradhanush, 352 districts have been selected including 279 mid-priority districts, 33 from the northeastern states and 40 districts from phase one where a large number of missed-out children were detected.

The second phase of the immunization drive will commence from October 7 for a week. This will be followed by week-long intensified immunization drives for three consecutive months, starting from November 7 and December 7 and January 7, 2016.

The first round of the first phase of Mission Indradhanush started from April 7 on the World Health Day in 201 high focus districts of 28 states. This was followed by three rounds of more than a week in the months of April, May, June and July 2015, starting from the 7th of each month.

The 201 high focus districts account for nearly 50 percent of all unvaccinated or partially vaccinated children in the country. Of these, 82 districts account for nearly 25 percent of all unvaccinated or partially vaccinated children of the country.