Health Department arranges awareness walk to save children from death

Lahore: On the eve of Universal Children’s Day and world toilet day being marked in the month of November; Save the Children Pakistan in collaboration with Punjab Health Department arranged an awareness walk from Government Gulab Devi Primary School to the Children Hospital in Lahore.

A walk was led by the Advisor to CM on Health Khawaja Salman Rafique, Senior officials of local government, Health department, IMNCH programme, Public Health Engineering, Education Department, Pakistan Pediatric Association and representatives of Save the Children and Civil Society and 300 school children from Government Gulab Devi School participated in the walk along with their teachers and other staff of school to highlight the importance of diarrhea prevention and control for ensuring safe and healthy childhood. The walk participants and children held placards and banners asking the relevant authorities to take steps to prevent children deaths due to diarrhea in the country.

The Health Advisor to CM Punjab Kh. Salman Rafiq said, “Access to adequate sanitation is also a challenge in Pakistan, fifty-two percent of the population does not have access to improved sanitation facilities, which leads to open defecation causing diarrheal diseases. He said that supply of drinking water was an important responsibility of the state and the Punjab government was making rapid progress on this front. Government of Punjab has committed funds to provide safe drinking water and improve sanitation services in all districts. Punjab government in partnership with Save the Children is piloting a 7 point plan to prevent and control diarrhea and it will scale up interventions in other districts of Punjab after successful completion of pilot in two districts.

“In Pakistan diarrhea is second leading cause of death among children less than 5 years of age, more than 53,000 children die each year because of preventable cause of diarrhea” said Dr Masood Abbasi, Director Save the Children Pakistan for Diarrhea Prevention & Control Program while talking to the media on the occasion. He further said that Save the Children Pakistan in close collaboration of Government of Punjab is working on diarrhea prevention &control program in Hafizabad and Khanewal districts. This program is first time focusing on multi-sectoral interventions which include provision of clean drinking water, improved sanitation and personal hygiene.

The efforts to involve and engage communities and especially other sectors are commendable and together we can reach some sustainable solution to check such a high mortality rate due to diarrhea”. The children winning the various contests were also awarded prizes as a token of appreciation.