Polio campaign kicks off in city

Drive to cover Karachi’s most vulnerable districts amid fears of immunity gap

Though the coronavirus pandemic had put the brakes on immunisation campaigns in the province, the Sindh Health Department finally launched a seven-day anti-polio vaccination drive in Karachi's two most vulnerable districts on Monday.

The provincial government aims to widen the campaign across the province next month, amid fears of an immunity gap due to the prolonged hiatus in vaccinations.

Inaugurating the drive, Sindh Health Minister Dr Azra Fazal Pechuho said it was a response campaign that would be conducted in five towns and 23 union councils of Karachi, aiming to administer polio vaccines to over 260,000 children under the age of five years in the city's Central and West districts.

She added that the drive would also help the health department ascertain the extent of public cooperation in the midst of the pandemic.

Immunity gap

The last such campaign prior to the coronavirus outbreak took place in March. Before that, monthly polio vaccination drives had been carried out between December and March. They were deemed successful, as health officials claimed that they had covered between 90 to 95 per cent of children under five years of age.

While the health department does not have exact data about how many children have been born in the province since March, documents with public sector data on live births, available with The Express Tribune, show that 25,291 babies were born in March while 21,132 were born in April.

Without any immunisation drives in this duration, these infants have not been administered the polio vaccine, leaving them vulnerable to the virus.

Health department officials, speaking to The Express Tribune on condition of anonymity, also disclosed that all environmental samples taken from Karachi, as well as some taken from the northern districts of the province, had been positive for the poliovirus.

On the basis of these positive environmental samples and given the lack of vaccination drives, it was assumed that the virus could potentially infect more children. Yet only one case of polio has been detected in the provincial capital so far this year.

A senior health department official explained this by saying that the poliovirus spread at a slower rate in the hot summer weather. "We hope it has not infected too many children," he added.

Another health official added that immunisation campaigns would be carried out in the remaining districts of the province from next month, while monthly drives were expected to continue till December.

According to the Emergency Operation Centre (EOC), as many as 20 children in Sindh have contracted polio so far this year, while 59 cases have been reported across the country.

Taking precautions

With Covid-19 still a concern, polio workers were directed to take precautions to prevent the coronavirus from spreading as they went from door-to-door, especially in communities that were not infected thus far.

As per the directives, the vaccinators were to be screened for Covid-19 symptoms, while also using masks and sanitisers and limiting physical contact with people, especially adults. They were also told to avoid contact with those showing coronavirus symptoms.

In a meeting on July 11, the Sindh chief minister had also directed the EOC to provide polio workers with protective personal equipment, while Dr Pechuho, too, said on Monday that they had all been provided safety gear by the health department. However, few vaccinators appeared to be wearing anything more than face masks and gloves on Monday.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 21^st, 2020.