KARACHI: As provincial health authorities launched another anti-polio drive across the province on Monday, the caretaker health minister at a programme identified ‘unregulated’ people’s movement to and from Afghanistan as one of the major factors impeding progress in the fight against polio.

The week-long campaign targets over 10m children across Sindh.

Around 80,000 workers, assisted by 5,300 personnel of law enforcement agencies, are taking part in the drive.

“We are importing the virus from Afghanistan and it’s not possible to stop people from entering the metropolis, though we can definitely ensure that children are administered polio immunisation drops at the city’s entry points,” Health Minister Dr Saad Khalid Niaz said while speaking to journalists at Karachi University where he opened a symposium.

Week-long campaign against polio begins across Sindh

He highlighted the government’s anti-polio efforts that had been aggressive but failed to eradicate the disabling infection.

This year, so far, Pakistan has reported five polio cases. Two from Karachi’s district East and three cases from Bannu district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

In addition, more than 50 environmental samples from different parts of the country, including those picked up from Karachi, have been tested positive for polio, indicating that a number of individuals are excreting the virus.

“Karachi’s positive samples have been found to be linked to Afghanistan. The situation is worrisome given the fact that the samples have tested positive repeatedly. It’s a threat not only to children in the region but also to those residing in other parts of the world,” the minister said at the launch ceremony of the anti-polio campaign held at a hospital in Sachal Goth.

The city, he said, was a challenge since it’s an economic hub attracting people seeking livelihood opportunities from across the country.

The minister emphasised that the polio vaccine was safe and effective and backed by medical experts and religious scholars, while making an appeal to the general public to protect their children by getting them vaccinated.

He also acknowledged efforts of polio workers and said the general public had no idea about the challenges they faced.

The officials in attendance included EOC Sindh coordinator Arshad Sodhar, deputy commissioner Altaf Ahmed Shaikh and WHO representatives.

Polioviruses, according to experts, grow in the intestinal system and are shed through feces. The infection typically spreads in areas with poor water and sewage sanitation; wild poliovirus is found in this type of environment and puts unvaccinated people at risk.

Only one out of 200 infections, they said, turned serious and led to irreversible paralysis while the rest of patients with the infection either didn’t have any visible symptoms or recovered after experiencing flu-like illness.

This explains why experts get worried when a single case surfaces. It means there would be 200 cases of infection, posing a threat to the whole community. Among the children who get paralysed, five to 10 die when their breathing muscles become immobilised.

In 2022, a total of 20 cases were reported in the country — all from three districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa — while a year earlier just one case of the crippling but preventable disease had been detected in the province of Baluchistan.

Published in Dawn, November 28th, 2023