Pakistan

Round 2 of anti-polio drive: Over 0.36m children miss out on vaccination

Health officials confirm new polio case in Balochistan

Sehrish Wasif/Shezad Baloch February 27, 2015

A total of 367,181 children under the age of five years could not be inoculated of which 35,818 cases were of parent refusals whereas 331,363 were not available at their homes during the campaign. PHOTO: AFP

QUETTA/ ISLAMABAD:

In the year’s second nationwide anti-polio drive, over 0.36 million children missed out on vaccination. Overall, an 8% decline was recorded in the number of children who could not be vaccinated.

As many as 400,000 children were reportedly missed in this year’s first anti-polio campaign, according to the documents available with The Express Tribune.

Documents revealed that a total of 367,181 children under the age of five years could not be inoculated of which 35,818 cases were of parent refusals whereas 331,363 were not available at their homes during the campaign.

Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) once again recorded the highest number of parental refusal cases with 27,742 followed by Sindh 3,408, Balochistan 3,210, Punjab 798, the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) 635, Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) 25. There were no refusals in Gilgit-Baltistan (G-B), and in Islamabad the drive is in progress.

Meanwhile, Punjab topped with 106% coverage, followed by Sindh 104%, G-B 101%, AJK and K-P 100%. In Balochistan and Fata, however, coverage remained sub-optimal with 85% and 67%, respectively.

Dr Rana Safdar, in-charge of the National Emergency Operation Cell (NEOC), said the decline in the number of parental refusals reflects that Pakistan is on track to overcome the issue related to children who miss out on the vaccine. “Pakistan is drawing up a strategy to reach every single child and for that it is in a process of formulating a separate plan for each district while considering the challenges there,” he said.

According to the official sources in the Ministry of National Health Services, Regulation and Coordination (NHSRC), currently Pakistan lacks accurate data on the number of children living in 497 high-risk union councils (UCs) for administering polio drops due to which it is unable to formulate strategies to reach overlooked children.

The international community has expressed grave concern over the high number of children who remain unvaccinated against the crippling disease. While commenting over the coverage in Balochistan which remained below satisfactory level, Dr Safdar said it happened because the anti-polio drive was postponed in four districts, adding that it was a bit early to comment over the success of the drive because the third party evaluation is under way.

Pledging $200m funds

The international donor community has established a trust fund under which they have committed $200 million to Pakistan for the strengthening of its National Immunisation Programme.

While talking to The Express Tribune, Muhammad Ayub Sheikh, secretary NHSRC, said out of the total amount the World Bank (WB) has pledged to give $50 million and Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation $80 million.

He said other international donors have yet to commit to provide the remaining amount of the money.

The World Bank has been assigned to look after the trust fund and the amount will be given to Pakistan on achieving deliverable link indicators set by the international donor community, he added.

The amount will be released to the federal and provincial government to be utilised for the up gradation of the existing Expanded Programme on Immunisation to ensure that every single child should get vaccinated against nine vaccine preventable diseases.

PSDP budget approved

The parliamentary panel unanimously approved Rs28.4 billion budgetary proposal regarding Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) for health projects for the fiscal year 2015-16 on Thursday.

During the meeting Saira Afzal Tarar, state minister for health, said the important projects, which include in the PSDP, were Establishment of a Current GMP Complaint SERA Processing Laboratory, NIH Establishment of Bio-Safety Level-3 Laboratories and Establishment of National Resource Centre for Raw Material among others.

Fresh case detected in Balochistan

Health officials on Thursday confirmed this year’s second polio virus case in Balochistan and the 13th one recorded in the country so far.

The latest victim is a two-year-old girl who had been vaccinated against polio several times in Killa Abdullah district.

An official of the provincial health department confirmed that Hanifa Bibi, a resident of Daman Ashezai union council in Killa Abdullah district, had contracted the crippling poliovirus.

Hanifa’s parents say the toddler was administered anti-polio vaccines during several campaigns. Though health officials and polio control room are calling Hanifa’s case the first confirmed polio case in Balochistan in the ongoing year, another case of the crippling disease was recorded in a boy, Shafi Mohammed, in Chagai district on the first day of 2015.

As many as 23 cases of poliovirus were detected in Balochistan in 2014.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 27^th, 2015.