ISLAMABAD: Weeks after the coronavirus vaccination roll out in the country, the experts have started urging the media to play its due role in sensitizing the masses about the importance of taking a jab to achieve the required immunity against Covid-19.
“To counter black propaganda, media has a crucial role to neutralize the conflicting statements about Covid-19 vaccine with proper facts,” said Prime Minister’s Focal Person Naseemur Rehman in an interview with Power 99 radio channel.
Naseem, who is an international professional with a specialization in development and humanitarian issues, said the world over immunity against various contagious diseases like measles and polio were achieved with the invention of vaccination.
“Invention of vaccination against various epidemics was a major achievement in the medical field during the last two hundred years,” he added.
He said, unfortunately, Pakistan has “yet to eliminate polio completely and that is mainly due to the negative propaganda and myths about the vaccination.”
Therefore, as a proactive move, the government, civil society and media should launch massive awareness drives to curb the disinformation, stemming from social media about the vaccine.
He said that there were multiple countries in the world, where the vaccination was mandatory and people had to face plenty for refusing to get vaccinated against a particular disease.
Naseem added that the coronavirus was still a looming threat and “it is early to celebrate the victory against the contagion.”
The focal person said that vaccination was imperative for one’s own safety as well as of their loved ones. The vaccines were launched after proper clinical trials so there was no need to be afraid of, he added.
He also feared that economic dividends, achieved by the government after successfully coping with the first and second waves of coronavirus, might get reversed in case of public resistance against the vaccination.
Currently, the frontline health workers are being vaccinated against the coronavirus under the first phase which was initiated by the government at the beginning of this month after receiving 0.5 million doses of Sinopharm vaccine from China.
According to the National Vaccination Strategy, health workers would be vaccinated in the first phase, while people aged 60 and above to get the vaccine in the second round and those from 18 to 60 years to be immunized in the third phase.
Recently, Minister for Planning Asad Umar announced the registration of 65 years old citizens and above for the national vaccination drive in the days to come. So far, the Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (DRAP) has given approval to four, out of total of eight most effective vaccines in the world, for their use in the country that included China’s Sinopharm, and CanSinoBio, Russia’s Sputnik-V and the Oxford University-AstraZeneca.
38 people died in the last 24 hours from coronavirus-related complications and 1,329 others tested positive for the contagious disease, National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) data showed Sunday.
According to the NCOC update, the new infections were detected from 41,395 samples collected and tested a day earlier.
With the new cases, the death toll jumped to 12,601 while the number of positive cases stood at 571,174.
The number of active cases has come down to 24,446 as over 534,000 people have recovered from the disease.
So far, Sindh reported 255,834 cases; Punjab 167,345; Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) 70,886; Balochistan 18,979; Islamabad 43,402; Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJ&K) 9,777 and Gilgit-Baltistan (GB) 4,951.
PUNJAB ANNOUNCES VACCINE COMMITTEE:
Meanwhile, the Punjab government announced the establishment of a committee to monitor the vaccination drive.
Primary and Secondary Healthcare Department Secretary Captain (r) Muhammad Usman said the committee will work under the supervision of concerned deputy commissioners.
“The [district] vaccine management committees will strictly monitor the vaccination drive,” he said.
The government launched a nationwide vaccination drive on February 2, a day after around 500,000 doses of vaccine produced by Sinopharm and donated by China had arrived in Pakistan.
As per the roll-out plan, the vaccine will first be made available to more than 400,000 doctors and frontline healthcare workers, teachers and social workers because they run the highest risk of exposure to the contagious disease.
After that, the shots will be provided to citizens over the age of 65, who generally face a higher mortality risk from the virus.
In line with the NCOC plan, the jabs are being administered across the province in phases, Usman added.
The government has constituted separate high-powered committees at the provincial, district and institutions levels for the vaccine management, storage and safe administration to the target population in order to ensure effective monitoring of the entire process.
The federal government has set up the National Immunisation Management System (NIMS), a two-way communication system to manage the national vaccination drive.
