| Tarlac
Rotarians give 10,000 children Vitamin A
doses, launch anti-dengue drive By
SABLEE BULAON and RACHELLE TAYONG
TARLAC CITY — Rotarians in the
province launched on August 28,
Wednesday, a two-day, two-pronged
campaign to provide children in six
depressed villages here with doses of
Vitamin A while at the same time holding
an information dissemination drive on how
to eliminate the dreaded dengue
fever-causing virus.
The activity was spearheaded by the
Rotary Club of Central Tarlac (RCCT),
which was participated in officers and
members of the Rotary Clubs of Tarlac,
Tarlac Metro, Downtown Tarlac ’86,
Midtown Tarlac and Poblacion Tarlac, as
well as students at the Tarlac State
University (TSU) belonging to the civic
group’s youth arm, the Rotaract
Club.
RCCT president, this city’s
former Mayor Gelacio Manalang, said in an
interview with TarlacNews
Tuesday at the City View Hotel that they
intended to serve approximately 10,000
children of impoverished families.
The activity, he added, was
coordinated with village officials of
barangays Laoang, Sto. Domingo, San Juan
de Mata, Sta. Maria, Sto. Niño and
Sinait, as well as Day Care centers and
public school teachers in the said
barangays.
The doses of Vitamin A that the
Rotarians will give will be enough to
supplement the child-beneficiaries’
dosage for one year, Manalang explained.
COMPREHENSIVE
ANTI-DENGUE CAMPAIGN
At the same time, while administering
Vitamin A doses to children, Manalang
said that volunteers from the different
Rotary Clubs of the province will also
provide residents of the said villages a
"comprehensive information" on
how to fight the dreaded mosquito-borne
dengue virus.
According to civic leader, the
information dissemination component of
the anti-dengue drive is "more
effective" than the periodic fogging
operations being launched by local health
units of the government.
The problem with fogging operations,
Manalang said, is that it is not being
regularly done due to the lack of
sufficient budget, which is being
compounded by the high cost of equipment
and chemicals needed to kill the
dengue-carrying mosquito, Aedes
aegypti.
"Ito ang pangunahing problema
ko nang ako ay mayor pa kaya lagi
tayong humihingi ng tulong sa mga civic
groups tulad ng Rotary para
mabigyan ng sapat na kaalamanan ang
taong-bayan (This was the primary
problem I faced when I was still the
mayor, that is why we always asked civic
groups like the Rotary to help in
educating the people)," he
said.
By providing residents with sufficient
information on how to fight dengue by
maintaining a clean community, Manalang
said that the Rotary Clubs are
effectively "empowering the
people" by making them part of the
campaign against the dreaded virus.
He further disclosed that the RCCT,
along with the other Rotary Clubs, will
launch other similar programs, such as
free medical-dental missions, as well as
providing poor but qualified students
with scholarship grants.
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