They brave it all silently to save our next generation
* Jaydip Chakrabarti
They are young, energetic and sincerely committed to save our future generations from deadly diseases. They – a group of more than 250 young-hearts are out to defy obstacles to reach out to families in far off and remote villages—braving all odds. While Covid19 has thrown a thick black blanket of uncertainties, these young people are silently working to ensure Routine Immunization (RI) sessions remain unaffected. Their unyielding efforts have been supported by technological solutions -eVIN -relating to maintaining the supply chain of vaccines in every corner of the State.
“These energetic youths are so dedicated and committed that sometimes, they walk miles on foot to reach villages under the searing sun while others swim across rivers/rivulets ensuring their presence with vaccine packs in villages at the right time and complete RI sessions”, says State Immunization Officer, State Health Department Dr Madhusudhan Chowdhury and then adds: Tripura achieved 93 per cent immunization in 2019-20.
“In the wake of Covid19, the Health Department has already prepared a contingency plan for covering up and improving the immunization rate during the current year", Dr Choudhury said and added, "Our target is to reach maximum number of targetted population. Immunizing 93 per cent is great achievement - but we are stressing on improving the rate further. For this we need community involvement. If local people participate in ensuring total immunization in every hemlet, Tripura will set an excellent example. In fact, incumbent Government is working in this direction". He also said that introduction of eVIN in 2019 had brought a major change and had ensured proper care of supply chain so that no beneficiary suffer due to lack of supply of vaccines and/or damaged vaccines.
Senior Project Officer, Dr Supratim Biswas focuses on ‘eVIN’ - Electronic Vaccine Intelligence Network – and says, this innovative technological solution has bolstered morale of our health workers.
Explaining eVIN, Dr Biswas says, “eVIN is a breakthrough initiative of United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Govt. of Tripura implementing the same through NHM in the State from May 2019. Now, the Routine Immunization programme of Tripura is being monitored and run through eVIN only. Around 300 ANM have been trained and each of 153 Health Facilities have been provided Mobile Phone and SIM internet facility by UNDP and NHM Tripura”.
Dr Biswas continues, Cold chains fitted with necessary technology under eVIN have been set up and were connected with an app. This app shows real time data about Vaccine stock in
particular PHC as well as temperature in which vaccines have been stored. “As soon as stock falls below stipulated level and/or temperature breaches 2 deg Celsius - 8 deg Celsius level, it is displayed in the app's dashboard and accordingly our staff take actions. Around 200 Temperature Loggers are installed in 153 Cold Chain Points which track temperature of storage of vaccines 24 x 7.
The man behind the implementation and smooth functioning of eVIN across the State is an Engineer – Rajat Bhattacharjee who is looking after the technical side. Importantly, eVIN is helping the concerned people to know the real time situation. "If temperate, for some reasons, soar above 8 deg Celsious, efficacy of vaccines will be affected. Before eVIn came into play, we, sitting in other districts could not know about the detoriorated quality of the vaccines - we had to rely on spot decision of the persons who were handling those. However, now, situation has changed drastically as we know details about the stock and its temperature. The technology is built in such a way and maintained by Er Rajat Bhattacharjee so professionally that eVIN app starts buzzing, sending warning SMS in case of temperature breach and shortage in stock, Dr Biswas explained.
Moumita Gope and Badal Goswami – Cold Chain managers of West and North districts – share their real life experiences in keeping the RI sessions going on at this critical time. Moumita Gope gave a live demo on the functioning of eVIN. Both Gope and Goswami say that eVIN had ensured efficacy of vaccines and the State Government is committed to provide an effective and timely immunization session to every beneficiary in the State.
* Jaydip Chakrabarti can be contacted at [email protected] / [email protected]