World No Tobacco Day

In Sudasar Kachi Basti, a high-risk urban settlement in Jaisalmer, WHO worked closely with the district health department to turn vaccine hesitancy into community confidence. Through Ratri Chaupal—nighttime dialogues with the community—and systematic follow-up by frontline workers at the anganwadi centre (child and daycare centre), families embraced immunization. The result: the proportion of unvaccinated children dropped dramatically from 75% to 20% within three months, protecting many more children from vaccine-preventable diseases. (© WHO India / Dhiraram Firod)

WHO field officers and frontline workers mapped every household and named every child eligible for polio vaccination in advance before going house-to-house to monitor polio vaccination coverage in Mali Pada village, Anandpuri block, Banswara district during the National Immunization Day for polio on 30 June 2026. (© WHO India / Narayan Singh)

In Banswara district, Rajasthan, WHO officers and frontline health workers carried vaccines carriers packed with polio drops across the Mahi River by rowboat and then on foot for around 5 km to immunize eligible children in Mali Pada in Anandpuri block. On National Immunization Day for polio on 30 June 2026, no child in the village was missed. (© WHO India / Narayan Singh)

A WHO team led by the Representative to India, Dr Yvan J.-F. Hutin, was briefed by experts at the Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme of the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) on how the Public Health Emergency Operations Centre detects signals in real-time for a timely response to outbreaks and health emergencies. NCDC’s Intermediate Field Epidemiology Training Programme (FETP) further enhances health security in the country—14 institutions and 77 WHO public health officers provide mentoring support to FETP to develop the next generation of public health leaders for India.