The Measles-Rubella Vaccination (MRV) Campaign will be conducted by Govt of West Bengal and will be targeting 2.54 crore population. Children aged between 9 months and less than 15 years of age will be given a single shot of Measles-Rubella (MR) vaccine irrespective of the fact whether they had taken the vaccine before.

A press meet was organized to announce this campaign. The campaign was attended by Dr Suresh Thakur, Dr Kaninika Mitra, Dr Debashish Roy, Dr Jayesh Mehta, Dr Arun Manglik, Dr Pallab Chatterjee and Dr Mousumi Nandi from West Bengal Academy of Pediatrics.

The MRV campaign has been launched with the sole aim of eliminating Measles and controlling Congenital Rubella Syndrome.

Speaking at the occasion, Dr Mousumi Nandi said “It is sad that children are dying from diseases which can be prevented easily by vaccines. Awareness must be created and with the help of this vaccine, one can prevent the child from death and life threatening complications like brain infection and so on”.

MR Vaccine is now included in Government’s Universal Immunization Programme, replacing Measles Vaccine.

The campaign is being conducted in phases and more than 13 crore children have already been vaccinated in 28 states/UTs. Since majority of the target population consists of school going kids, the vaccination sessions will be conducted at schools as well as in health facilities and outreach sessions.

Priyanka Dutta