ISLAMABAD: A nat­ionwide polio vaccination campaign is set to kick off all over the country on Monday — except in the Taxila tehsil of Rawal­pindi and Wana subdivision of the Federally Adminis­tered Tribal Areas (Fata).

The three-day campaign will be aimed at inoculating around 37 million children up to the age of five.

In Taxila, the campaign has been delayed by a day due to the Punjab Assembly’s PP-7 by-elections.

However, in Wana, the drive has been delayed till Sept 29 as the administration had requested for more time to make preparations.

Immunisation delayed in Taxila and Wana

National Emergency Ope­ra­tion Centre (NEOC) Co­ordi­nator Dr Rana Muhammad Safdar told Dawn that since nearly 37m children would be vaccinated they had sent as many as 41m doses of the polio vaccine all over the country.He said that over 100,000 teams were ready to go door-to-door to vaccinate children, while 16,000 community volunteers were involved to ensure that children would not be missed.

“This is a major campaign of the low-transmission season so the polio programme is very serious about it,” he said. “The target for vaccinated children has increased from 90 per cent to 95pc. If we gain momentum by vaccinating over 95pc children we will eradicate the poliovirus by the end of the year,” he added.

The low-transmission season begins in September and ends in May. Due to the low temperature, the poliovirus remains inactive during these months and can be eradicated easily.

“During the last two to three months, we have worked meticulously with provincial and district teams to overcome programmatic challenges in union councils which could not consistently perform at optimal levels,” said Dr Safdar, adding that the community-based vaccination initiative had successfully expanded.

He explained that the authorities were focusing on recruiting local women workers and training them. Micro-plans were updated with identification of high-risk mobile populations and clear mapping.

“Entire teams from the top to the bottom are fully char­ged to interrupt the virus transmission through the highest quality four monthly campaigns from September to December,” he said.

Pakistan has made pledges at several international forums that the poliovirus will be eradicated from the country by the end of the year.

There has been impressive progress in the reduction of polio cases — in 2014 there were more than 300 reported cases, in 2015 there were 54 and this year, so far 14 have been reported.

Published in Dawn, September 26th, 2016