Week-long polio campaign kicks off in Sindh

Vaccinators to follow pandemic SOPs in door-to-door drive

KARACHI:

Regretting that Pakistan was one of only two countries in the world plagued by polio, Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah urged parents on Saturday to cooperate with polio teams during the newly initiated vaccination drive for their "healthy future."

In a video statement issued in relevance to the launch of a week-long province-wide polio campaign on the day, the CM said, "Polio has been eradicated across the world, except in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and therefore, we, as a nation, have to join hands to eliminate the crippling disease in the country."

Further sharing his sentiments on the prevalence of polio in the country, he said that this year, thus far, 64 cases of polio had been reported from Pakistan, including 21 from Sindh, and dubbed the misfortune "quite painful."

"It is a crippling disease that disables children," the CM lamented, adding that parents often didn't cooperate with polio teams the government in getting their children vaccinated.

He urged people to cooperate with polio teams deployed for the door-to-door vaccination of children under the age of five years.

"We all have to join hands to eradicate polio to save our children from disability," he stressed, once again appealing to parents to allow polio teams to administer vaccination drops to their children, in line with coronavirus-related standard operating procedures (SOPs), during the newly started campaign.

"These campaigns are of utmost importance as we must administer the oral vaccine to our children, so as to protect them against polio and ensure their healthy future," the CM emphasised. "It is absolutely necessary that children receive this life-saving vaccine and I request all parents to allow the polio team to administer polio drops, as well as vitamin A [supplements], to their children, besides ensuring that their children complete their routine immunisation courses."

This was what was needed to ensure the healthy future of Sindh's children, as well as Pakistan, the CM added.

At the launch of the campaign, the CM administered polio drops and vitamin A supplements to some children at the Chief Minister's House.

The campaign

The latest province-wide anti-polio initiative has been launched by the Emergency Operation Centre (EOC) for Polio in Sindh. Initiated on Saturday, it will continue until August 21.

Under the campaign, the EOC aims to administer the oral polio vaccine to 9.2 million children under the age of five years, across all 29 districts of the province. Besides, to boost children's immunity, the body plans to administer vitamin A drops to 8.3 million children, between six months and five years of age, in Sindh.

As many as 49,781 polio workers and 8,497 supervisors have been deployed for door-to-door vaccination during the drive and instructions have been issued for them to follow all pandemic-related SOPs.

The precautionary guidelines include checking polio workers' body temperature before deploying them, use of hand sanitisers, not handling children directly and using a pen or a ruler to knock on the door.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 16^th, 2020.