KHULNA: Speakers at a view-exchange meeting yesterday underscored the need for making the forthcoming National vitamin ‘A’ plus campaign-2016 a success to address vitamin deficiency disorders among babies, reports BSS. Khulna Civil Surgeon Office and Khulna City Corporation (KCC) jointly organised the conference at School Health Clinic in the city to devise ways and means on how to make the programme a complete success.
Chaired by Khulna Civil Surgeon Dr Rafiqul Islam, Divisional Coordinator of World Health Organisation Dr Morshed Ahmed, Deputy Director of Khulna Divisional Information Office Javed Iqbal, Journalists Mokbul Hossain Mintu and Sheikh Abu Hassan, Assistant Director of Khulna Betar Mamun Akter addressed the conference.
Divisional Coordinator of World Health Organisation Dr Arifur Rahman delivered the welcome speech while Health Officer of Khulna City Corporation Dr Swapan Kumar Halder presented two key note papers.
Dr Swapan Kumar in his key note papers stated the main goal of the campaign is to maintain the prevalence of night blindness in children less than one percent through maintaining the high coverage of vitamin A supplementation among under five years children.
He said, in Bangladesh vitamin A supplementation save over 50,000 life of under five children per year along with reducing the severity and duration of illness like measles and diarrhea.
Besides, it keeps more than 20 million under-five children free from Vitamin A deficiency and prevents nutritional blindness like night blindness, Bitot’s spots and corneal lesions.
The view-exchange meeting was told that a total of 1,48,958 babies aged under 12-59 months will be administered red colour vitamin A capsule in Khulna district while a total of 81,067 babies will be administered red colour vitamin A capsule in Khulna city corporation (KCC) area.
Meanwhile, a total of 19,159 babies under 6-11 months will be administered blue colour capsule in Khulna district while a total of 10,775 babies will be administered in KCC area.