LANDI KOTAL: With improved coordination and support from the security forces, the Fata Secretariat has gained accessibility to all of Fata in order to vaccinate children against the crippling polio disease. 

This was claimed by Shakil Qadir, coordinator for Fata Emergency Operation Centre, while talking to Dawn on Sunday on the achievements of the centre in overcoming the spread of poliovirus in tribal areas during 2015. 

“We have successfully brought down the number of inaccessible children from 350,000 in June 2014 to a mere 16,500 by Dec 2015 as we were able to vaccinate almost 900,000 children during the recently held vaccination campaigns throughout Fata,” he said. 

Mr Qadir claimed to have also curtailed the number of ‘missed children’ to a mere one per cent. 

“International 1pc about polio vaccination give relaxation of up to two per cent of missing children but we are not taking risks as the virus is still in circulation in some parts of Fata and we are trying our best to bring that number to zero,” he said. 

He said health authorities were now having ‘worries’ about Tirah valley in Khyber Agency, Shawal valley in North Waziristan and some far flung localities in South Waziristan.

“In some areas the local administrations had been assigned the task to engage refusing parents; in some places we have given incentives to health teams for improving their performance and in some regions the old planning has been revised in order to plug loopholes,” he said, explaining the various strategies his centre was working on to achieve maximum results in the fight against polio. 

He regretted that poliovirus now existed only in Pakhtun inhabited areas both in Pakistan and Afghanistan. “We have difficulties in monitoring the mobility of children living in bordering areas as we have a porous border with Afghanistan with countless unfrequented and unmanned crossing points and this problem will persist for some years to come,” he said and added that with better planning and coordination, vaccination of children coming from Afghanistan through designated points had been intensified.

Published in Dawn, December 28th, 2015