Intensified Mission Indradhanush 3.0 Scheme

Why in News

Recently, the Intensified Mission Indradhanush (IMI) 3.0 scheme has been rolled out to cover children and pregnant women who missed routine immunisation during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Key Points

  • About the Intensified Mission Indradhanush (IMI) 3.0 Scheme:
    • Objective:
      • To reach the unreached population with all the available vaccines under Universal Immunisation Programme (UIP) and thereby accelerate the full immunization and complete immunization coverage of children and pregnant women.
    • Coverage:
      • It will have two rounds this year which will be conducted in 250 pre-identified districts/urban areas across 29 States/UTs.
        • The districts have been classified to reflect 313 low risk, 152 medium risk and 250 high risk districts.
      • Beneficiaries from migration areas and remote areas would be targeted as they may have missed their vaccine doses during the pandemic.
    • Significance: It will foster India’s march towards the Sustainable Development Goals.
  • Universal Immunization Programme:
    • Launch:
      • The Immunization Programme in India was introduced in 1978 as ‘Expanded Programme of Immunization (EPI) by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
      • In 1985, the Programme was modified as ‘Universal Immunization Programme (UIP)’.
    • Objectives of the Programme:
      • Rapidly increasing immunization coverage,
      • Improving the quality of services,
      • Establishing a reliable cold chain system to the health facility level,
      • Introducing a district-wise system for monitoring of performance, and
      • Achieving self-sufficiency in vaccine production.
    • Analysis:
      • UIP prevents mortality and morbidity in children and pregnant women against 12 vaccine-preventable diseases. But in the past, it was seen that the increase in immunization coverage had slowed down and it increased at the rate of 1% per year between 2009 and 2013.
      • To accelerate the coverage, Mission Indradhanush was envisaged and implemented since 2015 to rapidly increase the full immunization coverage to 90%.
  • Mission Indradhanush:
    • Objective:
      • To fully immunize more than 89 lakh children who are either unvaccinated or partially vaccinated under UIP.
      • Targets children under 2 years of age and pregnant women for immunization.
    • Diseases Covered:
      • Provides vaccination against 12 Vaccine-Preventable Diseases (VPD) i.e. diphtheria, Whooping cough, tetanus, polio, tuberculosis, hepatitis B, meningitis and pneumonia, Haemophilus influenzae type B infections, Japanese encephalitis (JE), rotavirus vaccine, pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV) and measles-rubella (MR).
      • However, Vaccination against Japanese Encephalitis and Haemophilus influenzae type B is being provided in selected districts of the country.
  • Intensified Mission Indradhanush 1.0:
    • Launch:
      • It was launched in October 2017.
    • Coverage:
      • Under IMI, greater focus was given on urban areas which were one of the gaps of Mission Indradhanush.
      • It focused to improve immunisation coverage in select districts and cities to ensure full immunisation to more than 90% by December 2018 instead of 2020.
  • Intensified Mission Indradhanush 2.0:
    • Launch:
    • Coverage:
      • It had targets of full immunization coverage in 272 districts spread over 27 States.
      • It aimed to achieve at least 90% pan-India immunisation coverage by 2022.

Source:TH