PESHAWAR: The authorities in violence-stricken North Waziristan tribal district made tight security arrangements as polio vaccination campaign started in six high-risk districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on Monday.

All 14 polio cases, reported in the country this year, belonged to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Health Minister Taimur Khan Jhagra and Chief Secretary Dr Shahzad Khan Bangash inaugurated the drive targeting 1,058,067 children for oral polio vaccines (OPV) while 994,583 to be given fractional dose of inactivated polio vaccine (fIPV) to boost their immunity against the virus. The campaign for OPV will continue for 10 days.

The district health officer of North Waziristan, Dr Wazir Khan Safi, told Dawn that they had put in place high security arrangements for the protection of the health workers in view of attacks, which resulted in the death of two persons and injuries to another.

Vaccine to be administered to 1,058,067 children during the campaign

“We are constantly in contact with the district administration, police, provincial and federal governments to ensure that the target children receive drops and stay safe from the childhood ailment,” he said.

North Waziristan is home to 13 polio cases of the 14 reported countrywide this year so far. One case has been detected in Lakki Marwat district. “The enhanced security has emboldened the vaccinators,” said Dr Wazir Khan.

He said that previously many children missed vaccination due to fake finger marking. “Now our vaccinators wouldn’t mark fingers of the children without vaccinating them,” he added.

In Peshawar, both health minister and chief secretary, who also co-chaired a meeting of task force on polio on Monday, vowed to stamp out poliovirus from the region and underlined the need for tailored strategies to cater to ground challenges.

“Emergence of polio cases in the province should serve as wakeup call to initiate remedial measures on war footing,” said the minister. He urged the health teams to bring to spotlight real issues and challenges such as fake finger marking and missed children so that those could be resolved.

The chief secretary thanked technical partners and all line departments, specially army and police, for their sacrifices and all out support for polio eradication. “Of late, we have seen plethora of challenges in interrupting virus circulation in the province, yet we are determined to overcome those obstacle to succeed in fulfilment of our goal,” he said.

Mr Bangash lauded incentives being given to the health workers in hotspot districts but ordered disciplinary action against under-performing workers across the board along with real time data reflecting the true picture of missed children.

He said that good quality campaigns were important to stop virus circulation in addition to report refusals to solve the issues hampering eradication of the virus.

Earlier, Additional Secretary Health (Polio) Asif Raheem gave presentation on the preparedness of the campaign and said that the drive had been started earlier in view of detection of virus from environmental sites in Nowshera, Swat, Peshawar and Bannu districts.

“Fake finger marking, missed children and low routine immunisation coverage are the biggest challenges. We have deployed monitors to hold accountable the workers showing laxity in their work,” he said.

He said that the fIPV plus OPV campaign would be carried out in Bannu, Lakki Marwat, North Waziristan, Dera Ismail Khan, Tank and South Waziristan.

In Lakki Marwat, around 1,000 policemen have been deployed to guard polio teams during the drive commenced on Monday.

An official said that police had made foolproof security arrangements for the protection of vaccinators to enable them to immunise the target population against the crippling disease without facing any trouble.

He said that the cops accompanied the teams during their field activities to administer anti-polio vaccine to children under the age of five.

“The law enforcers have also been deployed at fixed centres and with transit teams,” he said, adding that polio workers guarded by policemen completed the first day activity successfully.

Published in Dawn, August 16th, 2022