An official at the Prime Minister’s Polio Control Cell, requesting anonymity, said despite spending millions of rupees on awareness campaigns and anti-polio drives, the situation is getting worse as polio cases continue to surface.
He said the government and international organisations have completely failed to bring down the number of refusals.
“Around 50,000 refusal cases have been reported across the country in the last three years which speaks volume about strategic loopholes to counter the disease,” said the official.
He shifted the blame on to Unicef, saying the UN agency is responsible to control the surge in refusal cases as it is spending millions of rupees on awareness campaigns.
“Unicef has set up a team called Comnet which comprises around 2,000 qualified communication officers and social mobilisers at district, tehsil and union council levels,” the official said.
He revealed that communication officers are being paid handsome salaries of Rs60,000 to Rs100,000 and said it is their duty to deal with such cases.
The official said the team continues to create public awareness programmes but just conducting such programmes is not an indicator of success, rather a reduction in refusal cases will prove their efficiency.
Most refusals are reported from Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) and Pukhtun-dominated localities in other parts of the country, revealed the official.
Sharing data about the refusal cases, the official said 17,583 people from various high-risk union councils in K-P have refused to administer polio drops to their children in recent campaigns.
Those refusing the vaccine include displaced families from North Waziristan, who did not allow health workers to vaccinate their children during a three-day drive that began in the province on June 23, shared the official.
Most refusal cases were reported from Bannu and Lakki Marwat and other adjoining districts of K-P.
The official said polio cases will continue to surface until the root causes of refusals are addressed and the enormous funds for the purpose are put to good use.
So far, 55 polio cases have been reported from North Waziristan Agency out of a total 88 cases this year.
The refusals are damaging national anti-polio efforts, especially in K-P, where around 35,000 children are left unvaccinated in every drive.
According to the polio cell’s data, 66 polio cases have been reported from the tribal areas and 15 from K-P.
Unicef spokesperson Azmat Abbas Butt directed all queries to another official, who did not provide an answer till this story was filed.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 7th, 2014.
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