Mission Indradhanush enters the second phase

Mission Indradhanush, the flagship vaccination programme of the union health ministry is now in its second phase to bring more children under the routine immunization drive, and get them vaccinated.

The union health minister JP Nadda is implied to have said that the government is now aiming to achieve 90 percent full immunization in the country, by the end of 2020. As a part of the second leg of the mission, children who were left out in the initial phase will be targeted more comprehensively.

The step forward will be achieved by penetrating deeper into the states, which envisages to cover 352 districts including 279 mid-priority districts, 33 from the northeastern states and 40 districts. Strategically, these are the areas which have identified 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.

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.

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.

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.