Polio eradication: Anger at police for no-show at task force meeting

Task force chief writes letter to top cop asking about absence from meeting to discuss vaccination issues, security

PESHAWAR: The Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) government has sent a letter to the provincial police chief expressing its discontent over his failure to attend a meeting of the Provincial Task Force (PTF) on polio eradication.

Despite the fact that some 62 people including police personnel and vaccinators have been killed during anti-polio campaigns, police officials failed to attend the PTF meeting held in the provincial capital on Friday.

Officials stated that the meeting was scheduled for May 23 but had to be rescheduled for May 31 due to unspecified reasons. Senior officials dealing with polio eradication efforts added that despite having been informed of the change, police officials still failed to attend the meeting.

“Inspector General of K-P Police (IGP) Muhammad Naeem is one of the important members of the PTF and since violence against polio workers was one of the important thing on the agenda, police officials should have been here,” a senior official informed.

“It is astonishing that not a single officer from the police department is present here,” a senior official told the chair – the K-P additional chief secretary – who then issued directions for a letter of discontent to be sent to the police to ask why they failed to send any representative.

Besides the police department’s lax attitude, the meeting also raised questions over the performance of district health officers during anti-polio campaigns. “The discussion was that the DHOs were not performing their duties as required,” another official informed.

The official, who requested anonymity as he is not allowed to speak to the media, stated that the meeting issued directions to all the district health officers to make sure their performance was up to the mark during future anti-polio drives.

The PTF meeting discussed in detail different items in order to eradicate the crippling virus from the region and also to involve members of the local government, as they are public representatives from their own communities.

Officials privy to the meeting informed that local government representatives belong to the same communities, are influential, and could help convince parents while also playing an important role in countering propaganda against the vaccine.

“These are the people on ground, present within the community 24/7 and we hope with bringing them onboard, it will prove fruitful for the programme,” one of the PTF members told The Express Tribune, adding that all the stakeholders must play their respective parts, otherwise children would be put at risk.

A total of 20 cases have been confirmed in the first five months of 2019, with 14 cases from Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa including six from the recently-merged tribal districts, besides three each from Sindh and Punjab.

The K-P Police spokesman could not be reached for comment despite repeated attempts.

Meanwhile, the Emergency Committee of the World Health Organisation has suggested a thorough analysis of the situation in Pakistan be urgently undertaken to understand what factors have led to the recent deterioration in polio eradication efforts, which it called the most serious since 2014.