JOIN US1.1 lakh students in DK to get iron, folic acid tablets
As many as 1,11,867 students from 932 schools in Dakshina Kannada district will be benefitted under the National Weekly Iron and Folic Acid Supplementation (WIFS) programme that was launched across the nation on Wednesday. This includes students from 654 government higher primary schools, 161 highschools, 210 aided higher primary schools and 119 aided highschools.
The WIFS programme was formally launched at Government Higher Primary School, Attavar in the city on Wednesday. In the introductory remarks, Reproduction and Child Health Officer Dr Rukmini M said, under the programme, one iron folic acid tablet will be given to every student studying from VI to X Std, on every Monday. Earlier, students from VI and VII Std were given tablets under Akshara Dasoha, where tablets are compulsorily given to all children from I to VII Std.
Now, VI and VII Std students are detached from Akshara Dasoha and are brought under the ambit of health department.
The programme intends to prevent anaemia caused due to iron deficiency among adolescents. With 55 per cent of the Indian population suffering from anaemia, it is significant to prevent the problem at an early stage. The tablets supplied by the government (that are not for sale) are given to students after an hour of consuming lunch.
Apart from it, Albendazole tablets will be given to students for de-worming once in every six months. Health talks and counselling too will be conducted in schools to give information about healthy diet to students, specially girls. The programme also covers school drop out adolescents. Anganawadi centres have been entrusted the task of identifying school drop outs and supply them with iron tablets.
Tablets have been supplied to anganawadis for the effective implementation of the scheme, Dr Rukmini told reporters on the sidelines of the programme.
Deputy Commissioner N Prakash launched the programme by symbolically distributing tablets to five students.