Health awareness: Pakistan could face travel sanctions over polio

“We need media support in creating awareness that vaccinating children is our national responsibility,” says Cheema.

LAHORE:

Pakistan faces the risk of travel sanctions after June 2013 if the polio virus is not stopped in the country, said Health Department Director General Nisar Cheema on Thursday.

“We need media support in creating awareness that vaccinating children is our national responsibility,” Cheema said at a media workshop arranged by the Health Department at Royal Palm Golf and Country Club.

He said that in countries with adequate awareness of the problem, for example in Egypt, there were no door-to-door polio vaccination campaigns as parents took their children to clinics to get them vaccinated themselves.

He said that good hygiene was vital to protecting a child from measles, polio and other diseases.

Expanded Programme on Immunisation Director Tanveer Ahmed spoke about risk factors for polio and measles, including myths about the effects of the vaccine on virility. The media should address such issues as the notion that the polio and other vaccines could cause impotency or sterility were entirely false, he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 22^nd, 2013.