Indore: Diphtheria, Pertussis and Tetanus vaccination campaign starts; students in 155 urban and 163 rural schools get vaccines

Indore (Madhya Pradesh): The health department launched a campaign to inoculate children against DPT (diphtheria, pertussis and tetanus) on Tuesday with the aim of vaccinating about 21,000 children in the district. The campaign of vaccinating children will continue till August 31.

According to district immunisation officer Dr Tarun Gupta, the campaign is being run in 155 schools in the urban areas and in 163 schools in the rural areas.

“It will be a statewide campaign during which students of Classes 1, 5 and 10 will be inoculated against these bacterial diseases. We have a target of vaccinating about 200,000 children in the district and administering the DPT and TD booster dose for tetanus and diphtheria vaccines,” Dr Gupta said.

It will be a statewide campaign to administer the DPT vaccine to children of Class 1 and TD (booster dose) to children of Classes 5 and 10. The campaign is also meant to target students of the age group of 10 and 16 years along with five years of age as some cases were reported in the higher age groups, as well.

The campaign in Indore was inaugurated by collector Manish Singh and the health department has asked the school education department to inform parents about the same to get their consent.

Three vaccine formulations are available to protect against these diseases. The DPT vaccine is given to children 6 weeks to 6 years of age to protect them from all three illnesses. It is given at 2 months, 4 months, 6 months, 15-18 months and 4-6 years.