PESHAWAR: Emergency Operation Centre for Polio will a five-day immunisation campaign today (Monday) amid challenges posed by positivity of sewage samples and fake finger marking.

“Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is yet to record any polio infection this year so far but many of its districts are endemic for the virus, which is cause of a concern,” a senior official in health department told this scribe.

According to him, the recent polio case diagnosed in Islamabad resembling the virus found in Lakki Marwat district means that the province is not free of the virus.

He said that 33 sewage samples from different districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had so far tested positive for poliovirus in the current year.

Vaccination drive begins today in 27 districts of KP

Pakistan has so far recorded 17 polio cases this year including 12 from Balochistan, three from Sindh and one each from Punjab and Islamabad.

A statement issued by the government said that the campaign would be run in two phases targeting more than 6.42 million children under five years of age.

In the first phase, oral polio vaccine will be administered to 5.75 million children in 27 districts of the province. In the second phase, to begin on September 23, about 672,000 children will get drops in three districts.

Officials said that the vaccination campaign would start simultaneously in 115 districts across the country targeting more than 33 million children. However, authorities concerned are worried about the four virus reservoirs including Karachi, Quetta, Peshawar and Khyber.

Peshawar and Khyber in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa have not reported any polio case but their sewage water samples are positive. Sewage water sample in Peshawar, which diagnosed its last case in 2020, has been positive for the past 18 months.

Recently, Chief Secretary Nadeem Aslam Chaudhry at the meeting of the provincial task force on polio showed deep concerns over the presence of virus in water and termed it a hidden bomb that could explode anytime.

During the meeting, the deputy commissioner of Peshawar pointed towards lack of accountability among the partner organisations and complained that they had identified 210 poor performers in Peshawar but their request for action had fallen on deaf ears.

The people, he said, could be cause of low quality campaign in the district, which is recording 20,000 refusals in every drive.

Officials familiar with polio programme said that in each campaign, the coverage was recorded on average 99 per cent but presence of virus in sewage water sample showed that quality of vaccination was not up to the mark.

They said that more than 110 persons including health workers and policemen had been killed by militants during polio campaigns since 2012 while 150 sustained injuries due to which vaccinators worked under constant threats.

They said that vaccinators were forced to mark fingers of children with indelible ink without giving them anti-polio drops. In that way, the children were registered as vaccinated and health workers escape parents’ wrath, they added.

“Non-existence of a polio case can be attributed to the lack of interest by polio staffers to identify suspected cases and take their stool samples for laboratory examination,” said officials. The staffers is required to collect specimen for test within 14 days. They need to test the same twice within 24 hours apart but record shows that this is procedure is followed due to which the virus cannot be traced.

Officials said that the UN agencies and other partner organisations should work in coordinated way to wipe out the virus before the cash-flow of foreign countries for polio eradication dried up.

They said that deputy commissioners and district health officers were responsible for any laxity in polio campaigns. However, they lacked powers to initiate action against the staffers deployed by the partner organisations, they added.

Published in Dawn, September 9th, 2024