Every citizen needs to contribute towards creating awareness in this regard
KARACHI: With the rise in polio in the country, Pakistanis have had to go through the pain of seeing their country being in the news for all the wrong reasons once again. The question to ponder over here is, why has Pakistan failed miserably to curb the disease despite the hefty international aid donated to invest in the immunisation programmes? The answer lies in an entangled web of illiteracy on the part of the population and departmental delinquency from the government’s side. The health officials blame the lack of security and the augmented militant attacks on the polio vaccination teams for their failure.
Furthermore, many conservative people in rural areas believe that polio drops can have a harmful effect on their children and so regularly refuse to get them vaccinated. As a result, the polio vaccination process is greatly impeded. Pakistan recently broke its 14-year-old record of registering the most number of polio cases in a year. This is indeed highly embarrassing. The recently imposed travel restrictions imposed by the World Health Organisation have once again put a shameful tag on Pakistanis travelling abroad. Rooting out the misuse of international funds is a tedious task, but educating parents on how important it is to get their children immunised against the disease is all the more important. Every citizen needs to contribute towards creating awareness in this regard. Otherwise, we will all be looking at a bleak future for our children.
Alina Tafsir
Published in The Express Tribune, October 16th, 2014.
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