Rotary Rally at Hatirjheel on World Polio Day, Call to Raise Awareness on Child Vaccination

Rotary International held a colourful rally on Hatirjheel Lake Road in the capital on the occasion of World Polio Day. The programme was organised to take the importance of polio eradication to everyone.

Various placards, festoons and awareness messages were displayed at the rally. Through those messages, the need to protect children from polio was brought to the fore once again.

Rotarians and participants from different walks of life took part in the rally. That broad participation turned the programme from an event of a single organisation into a wider social awareness initiative.

The participants expressed solidarity with the ongoing global efforts to eradicate polio, according to a press release from the organisation. That solidarity between the people of Bangladesh and the worldwide eradication campaign was one of the rally's central messages.

The rally was led by Rotary International's Bangladesh Country Coordinator and former Rotary Governor Ishtiaq Zaman and Deputy Country Coordinator and former Rotary Governor A K M Shamsul Huda.

The programme placed the greatest emphasis on raising public awareness for polio eradication, because a vaccination programme can only succeed when ordinary people have a clear understanding of the disease and how to prevent it.

Encouraging parents to vaccinate their children was also highlighted in particular. Families were urged to take an active part so that every child receives the vaccine on time.

Increasing public engagement in the effort to build a polio-free world was another focus of the rally. The organisers' message was that the eradication goal can be reached not through health workers alone, but with the involvement of society as a whole.

Rotary International has been working on polio eradication around the world for a long time. Years of work in this field have made the organisation one of the best-known names in the effort.

In coordination with international health organisations and local communities, the organisation has been running various initiatives to keep children safe from polio. It regards this method of working at the local level as effective.

The Hatirjheel rally was a continuation of that long-running work. Although the programme ended with awareness messages spread among the public, its central note remained the call to build a polio-free world.