Y4PE (Youth for Polio Eradication)

Y4PE draws on youth energy and engagement as a powerful and credible tool for disseminating information, undertaking advocacy, sparking peer-to-peer communication, and generating awareness about polio related issues. Primary channels/platform for engagement with youth and adolescents under Y4PE include:

• Nehru Yuva Kendra Sangathan (NYKS) in select high-risk States/Provinces, Ministry of Youth Affairs - Each NYKS youth club has an average of 35-40 volunteers, and they reach out to the entire population of their village (average population of 1,000 per village). Y4PE activities, at Village/Block/District level, included rallies, group discussions with other youth groups and Mahela Mandals (women's groups), storytelling sessions with school children, sports and cultural activities at the village level, and linkages with faith leaders and Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs).
• National Service Scheme (NSS) of the universities across India - Community-based and inter-university activities on various polio and RI issues have been carried out in select high-risk districts in a few states. For example, volunteers of the BBK DAV College for Women, Amritsar, organised a few polio awareness campaigns in select villages (based around government schools). Volunteers first promoted the activity by plastering the walls with handouts (sent by UNICEF and Rotary) and subsequently conducted storytelling (using Rotary International comics) with each camp comprising approximately 150 young children/students. Then, on the eve of Polio Eradication Day (October 24), the NSS department of DAV College, Amritsar, organised a cycle rally to create awareness among general masses about the crippling disease. Students from colleges and schools from all over Punjab carried posters and banners that depicted the consequences of this disease among people, riding on their cycles for over 2 kilometers.
• In-school interventions - This involves engaging with in-school adolescents through an extra co-curricular component comprising art-expression contests, debate, elocution, and theatre competitions, aimed at providing the students with basic knowledge of polio and its related risk factors. Following a few pilots in 2011, in 2012, it was institutionalised through the government-run chain of Schools across India - the Kendriya Vidyalayas (KVS Sangathan, Ministry of Human Resources Development).
• Information and communication technology (ICT) knowledge-sharing and interactive platforms for youth - For instance, the Y4PE Facebook page is a knowledge-sharing platform that promotes discussion forums, disseminates key polio prevention messages, promotes advocacy videos/info, exhibits photo galleries, provides the latest news/views, and updates polio-events-related information. In 2011 alone, the year this Facebook page was started, "[a] number of people wrote on the page wall, offering their support for the initiative, recognizing the need for the youth to play a proactive role in bringing about the specific behavior changes required for absolute and sustained Polio Eradication." It also connects with various youth clubs, youth networks, and voluntary groups working with young people.
• Youth icons reaching young through video news reels (VNRs) - Integral to the Y4PE initiatives is pro-active engagement with a select youth icons in the country, whose voice and support to the polio programme gives a new cutting edge to the outreach communication work with young people. Youth icons in the country, such as famous musical bands, well-known athletes/players, film/drama/theatre personalities, and even lesser-known young faces based in communities doing outstanding work in the social sector, could serve as catalytic change agents in motivating youth functionaries/leaders in universities, NSS units, and NYKS youth clubs to advocate for prevention strategies related to polio virus transmission among young children in India. "A tentative list of Y4PE Youth-Icons was drawn in August 2011, which was meant to explore their possible involvement with the Polio Eradication programme." A famous rock band, "Indian Ocean", appeared in one such VNR, which gained high popularity among university and school youth across various Provinces.

Immunisation and Vaccines, Youth

Y4PE shares: "Primary messages to be shared among the youth and in the community:

• Polio paralyses for life and even kills. Polio has no cure.
• Polio can be prevented by administering two drops of oral polio vaccine (OPV) to children at every available opportunity - polio campaigns and Routine Immunization.
• OPV is safe and effective and used all over the world. It is safe to give OPV to a child with minor illness such as cold, cough, mild fever and diarrhea.
• It is important to take OPV dose each time it is offered - in polio campaigns as well as in routine immunization. Each additional OPV dose boosts the child's protection against polio.
• Routine Immunization is a must to protect children against life threatening diseases such as TB [tuberculosis], diphtheria, measles, tetanus, whooping cough and polio.
• Good hygiene and sanitation, exclusively breastfeeding children up to 6 months and managing diarrhoea through ORS [oral rehydration salts] and Zinc supplementation helps improve child's health and immunity to fight diseases including polio.
• Polio vaccination is available free of cost during National/State Immunization Days and at government health facilities along with other vaccines which protects against other life threatening diseases, as part of routine immunization."