Deworming campaign receives discouraging response in Haripur

HARIPUR: A school-based deworming campaign of the provincial government received a discouraging response from parents in the district on Thursday as many forced children to stay at home while teams visited schools to administer anti-worm pills to kids.

The provincial government has launched the deworming campaign in 19 districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. In Haripur, the teachers of government schools were to administer pills to all the students aged 5 to 15 years. However, the campaign witnessed a discouraging response as most of the schools witnessed 50 percent or less attendance of students. According to official sources, the parents were not ready to get children administered the deworming pills. According to some of the teachers, parents were approached and questioned about the absence of their children.

The parents’ response was based on apprehensions attached to such massive campaigns conducted in the past, especially the polio drives. A teacher from a primary school of Alooli village stated that over 60 percent of the students were absent while several of the parents whose children attended school, visited them and asked them not to get the pills.

It was also reported that some of the students complained of vomiting and stomach pain following the administering of deworming pills. However, health department sources said that vomiting was one of the side effects which could be reported from a small number of children but it was no cause of concern.

On the other hand, the District Education Officer Umar Khan Kundi said that he has no information about the refusal or massive absence of the students based on deworming exercise.

The official added that 1,40,000 students were the target of this programme and he was not sure that such a massive refusal could have been reported.

He said that stereotyping was the only reason that could have forced some parents to avoid anti-worm pills to children. The official added that he would be in a position to confirm the number of refusals and leftover children once he gets a detailed report from his subordinate staff.