National Command Operation Center Chief Asad Umar has said the federal government is going to launch a mass campaign for coronavirus vaccination, reporter 24News HD TV channel.

While addressing a press conference in Islamabad after chairing a session of the NCOC to review the coronavirus situation in the country on Monday, he said the restrictions imposed by the government before Eid had made the situation better as the coronavirus positivity rate was declining.  

Umar said that the government was hoping to get enough people vaccinated by Eid-ul-Azha so that there would be no need to impose restrictions like they had to on Eid ul Fitr.  

He said that all departments of federal or provincial governments were working together against COVID-19.

Asad Umar said that the government would seek the help of the media for the vaccination campaign. He said one million doses of the coronavirus vaccine would reach Pakistan in the month of June and the same amount would reach in July. He informed that seven million people had been vaccinated till now. He said that the vaccination would be available for free for the people above 18 years of age.

Asad Umar said that the federal government asked the provinces to increase their capabilities to act against the spread of coronavirus cases. “We want to achieve a target of 70 million vaccinations by the end of this year,” he said.

Umar said that they were going to adopt a ‘whole of government’ approach to combat the pandemic. He said under the whole of government approach, the National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) would hold a meeting with media owners and anchorpersons tomorrow. He said the media played a positive role when coronavirus was first reported. He said they wanted a big vaccination campaign focusing on why vaccination is necessary and media could help in this regard. He further said that the NCOC would invite business forums and ask them to join the government to fight against the pandemic. “We will tell them how we want their help. We do not want their money, we will give them vaccines and through them, we will try to vaccinate their employees and their families,” he said and added that in the next step of the campaign, the government would reach out to the religious scholars.

He said to further the campaign, the government would reach out to the bar councils and journalist organizations as well.

He said their strategy could only be successful when every Pakistani took part in it.