Anti-polio drive: Below 90% coverage unacceptable: Tarar

Praises Punjab for ensuring 100% vaccination coverage against the crippling disease

ISLAMABAD:

Minister of State for National Health Services Saira Afzal Tarar on Thursday cautioned provincial authorities that anti-polio campaigns covering below 90% of the vulnerable child population was “unacceptable” and “insufficient” to keep the polio threat at bay.

“Without having 100% coverage of anti-polio drives in each province of the country, it is not possible for Pakistan to win fight against polio,” Tarar told reporters after attending the National Assembly Standing Committee on Health.

At the same time, she heaped praise on the authorities in Punjab for achieving its set target and ensuring 100% coverage during the first nationwide anti-polio drive. This year Punjab mounted its campaign on January 12, a week earlier than the scheduled date, leaving its anti-measles drive for January 26.

Meanwhile, talking to The Express Tribune, Mohammad Kashif from polio cell, Islamabad Capital Territory, stated that a total of 132,133 children under the age of five were targeted, however, 138,449 were vaccinated during the drive started from January 19.

“A total of 135 parental refusal were recorded which are expected to be addressed during 15 days follow-up activities by social mobilisers of Unicef,” he added.

Meeting with ulema

Terrorism is the biggest constraint in polio eradication and the government has decided to eliminate it through Operation Zarb-e-Azb, said Ayesha Raza Farooq, the Prime Minister's focal person on polio eradication.

Hopefully peace would be resorted soon which will help in fighting against polio, she affirmed. She was chairing the 4th meeting of National Islamic Advisory Group on ‘Streamlining Islamic Scholars Support for Polio Eradication and Immunization at National, Provincial and District Levels’ organised on Thursday.

Ayesha Raza said every effort was being made by the government as well as all the stakeholders to defeat polio, adding that ulemas possess vital role in eradication of polio and the government has also provided training to almost 550 Islamic scholars regarding the disease eradication and awareness.

Meanwhile, the participants agreed that the media should be involved with renewed focus on fighting the crippling disease while the scholars who have reservations regarding polio vaccine and the vaccination procedure should be approached and taken into confidence.

They also agreed upon on the point that ulema of the remote areas and union councils of polio sensitive districts should be persuaded to have positive results.

Participants were told by the WHO representative that so far 400 cases have been identified in the world, of which 306 cases were identified in Pakistan alone while the biggest problem to deal with the menace of polio is security challenge.

Secretary General Wafaaqul Madaaris Qari Hafeez Jalandhari stressed that fatwas given by the authentic scholars regarding polio eradication should be disseminated accordingly as this could help in convincing people.

Bill Gates’ prediction

Former CEO of Microsoft and famous philanthropist Bill Gates predicts the end of polio and three other diseases from the world in the next 15 years.

“It'll be 2018 or within one or two years of that,” he was cited by The Associated Press as saying in an interview on Wednesday, adding that it will be a “much better eradication track record in these 15 years than in all of human history”.

Africa hasn't had a case in the past six months, with most of the cases recorded in Pakistan last year. Gates said the Pakistani government is stepping up its efforts against polio, “knowing they're last, the spotlight's on them”.

It takes three years of no documented cases to certify that a disease has been eradicated, so the earliest that polio will be declared over is 2018.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 23^rd, 2015.