Fighting polio, still: Twelfth polio case surfaces in North Waziristan

The father refused to have the child inoculated.

ISLAMABAD:

A seven-month old child in North Waziristan was diagnosed with polio on Tuesday, increasing the country’s polio toll to 12 cases this year.

According to official sources, the affected child, Bakhthullah, was not inoculated against polio because his father, Janullah, who lives in Mami-Rogha area of Miranshah had refused. The case has been confirmed by the National Institute of Health (NIH).

Health experts said this type of polio virus was previously found in the 14 cases previously registered in Waziristan, proving that the virus exists in the region.

During the year, two cases of polio were reported each in Sindh and Balochistan, one in Punjab, three in Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata), while four cases were reported in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P). No case has so far been registered in Gilgit-Baltistan or Azad Jammu and Kashmir.

Last year, out of a total of 198 polio cases registered in the country, 14 were reported from Waziristan. The provinces have been asked to ensure effective polio awareness drives to educate parents to vaccinate their children against the crippling disease.

An official of the National Polio Eradication Programme said that district health managers have been strictly directed to ensure that every child in their respective area is inoculated in national polio immunisation campaigns, especially in the high-risk areas. He said that during the year’s first national immunisation campaign in January, 33 million children under the age of five were inoculated.

He assured that the polio vaccine used in the campaigns was safe and effective, adding that it is produced internationally under the approval of the World Health Organisation. He said the same vaccine is used to eradicate polio in most parts of the world, including Saudi Arabia and Indonesia. He said UN agencies, partners, donor governments, the private sector and foundations were extending all possible support to ensure that the necessary resources were available to ensure the country could be declared polio-free.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 7^th, 2012.