The three-day campaign will now kick off on Tuesday with 189 medical officers supervising the drive at the union council level in Karachi where eight polio cases have been detected this year. – AP Photo

KARACHI, Oct 23: Another round of supplementary vaccination as part of a three-day nationwide anti-polio campaign scheduled to begin on Oct 24 has been deferred for a day because of the federal government decision to observe a public holiday on Monday to mourn the death of Nusrat Bhutto.

The three-day campaign will now kick off on Tuesday with 189 medical officers supervising the drive at the union council level in Karachi where eight polio cases have been detected this year.

The National Coordinator of the Prime Minister’s Monitoring and Coordination Cell for Polio, Dr Altaf Bosan, informed Dawn that the nationwide campaign would cover about 32.7 million children below five years. Around 38 million doses of polio vaccine would be administered through 94,000 teams, he added.

In Sindh, 7,518,660 children would be vaccinated during the three days, said Sindh Public Health Director Dr Masood Solangi.

In all, 21,160 mobile and stationary vaccination teams would run the campaign at fixed and transit points within the remit of 1,129 union council supervisors and 4,068 officials in charge of respective areas, he added.

Sindh has reported 27 polio cases so far this year — eight in Karachi, six in Thatta, three in Badin, two each in Sanghar, Kambar, Tando Mohammad Khan and one each in Hyderabad, Jamshoro, Umerkot and Tando Allahyar.

Disturbed over the increase in number of detected polio cases in Karachi, Dr Bosan said that there was a need to bring uniformity in high-quality vaccination activities in the metropolis, particularly the high-risk areas, and creating a demand for the vaccination through effective awareness drives in such areas.

“Since the Type-1 polio virus is being persistently isolated in the sewage samples collected from Gadap, Baldia and Gulshan-i-Iqbal towns of Karachi for the last one year, there’s no room for compromise on the quality of campaigns.”

Orangi, Gadap, SITE, Gulshan-i-Iqbal and Saddar have reported a total of eight polio cases this year against the last year’s three cases reported in Baldia, Gulshan-i-Iqbal and Korangi.

According to the health department of the city government, there are 61 high-risk union councils in Karachi, including all the eight union councils in Baldia Town, six union councils (1, 6, 8, 9, 11 and Karachi Cantt) in Saddar, five (10, 11, 12, 13 and 14) in Gulshan-i-Iqbal, five (2, 4, 5, 7 and 9) in North Nazimabad, four (4, 5, 6 and 7) in Bin Qasim, four (4, 5, 6 and 7) in Gadap, four (1, 4, 7 and 9) in North Karachi, four (2, 5, 7 and 9) in SITE, three (2, 4 and 7) in Jamshed, three (1, 10 and 11) in Liaquatabad, two (4 and 8) in Gulberg, two (5 and 7) in Keamari, two (1 and 2) in Korangi, two (4 and 9) in Landhi, two (6 and 8) in Lyari, two (1 and 7) in Malir and two union councils (1 and 7) in Shah Faisal and UC-13 in Orangi.

“Under a new strategy, the officials in charge of zones have been replaced by medical officers who will work as union council supervisors,” said District Officer (Preventive) Dr Aslam Pervez.

He added that the towns having UCs with large areas, population or cantonments would, however, have more than one union council supervisor.

A total of 189 UC supervisors would be designated in 178 union councils of the city, he said, adding that they would also head the union council committees on polio.

He said that a total 5,526 mobile teams and 609 fixed teams would administer oral polio vaccines to about 2.34 million children during the three days.

“This time the teams will also give Vitamin-A doses to children between six months and five years,” he said.

The Sindh health department, meanwhile, directed three senior medical officers, Dr Abdul Shakoor Abbasi, Dr Kamaluddin Syed and Dr Zulfiqar, to take the charge of the town health officer post in Saddar, Baldia and SITE, respectively, until the vacant posts were filled with THOs.

The posts had fallen vacant following the suspension of three officers over three months back reportedly for their inadequate performance in polio campaigns.