‘Parents in posh areas too turning away vaccinators’

Educated and wealthy parents living in Karachi’s posh areas too are refusing to have their children administered polio drops and turning away vaccinators during routine and special anti-polio vaccination drives, a health official said on Monday.

A six-day anti-polio vaccination drive was launched in the province on Monday on the occasion of the World Polio Day.

Polio eradication officials are still working hard to convince the citizens of Karachi to have their children vaccinated against polio and reduce the refusal rate. However, most refusal cases are being reported in posh areas where parents are unwilling to have their children administered oral polio vaccine drops

 “These parents argue that they go to private hospitals to have their children vaccinated,” an official of the Emergency Operations Centre (EOC) Sindh told The News.

Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nigeria are the only three countries left where polio virus still exists because parents refuse to have their children vaccinated.

The EOC Sindh official said only the Polio Eradication Initiative had the polio vaccine, which was being acquired from the Global Vaccine Alliance and no private hospital or health organisation was authorised to purchase or import or sell the vaccine in the country. “Even private hospitals which are administering polio vaccine drops acquiring them from polio vaccinators and the Polio Eradication Initiative,” he added.

“Some private hospitals are charging wealthy, educated parents for the vaccine even though it’s free.”

The official deplored that instead of having their children vaccinated by the vaccinators who visited door to door every month in the country, wealthy parents turned them away.

“Because of the complex polio situation in Pakistan, it is advised that every child is vaccinated and administered oral polio vaccine every time a polio vaccinator visits a house. The virus was now attacking children with weak immunity and even those who have received a few OPV doses in the past.”

The official said earlier parents belonging to the uneducated and poor segments of the society refused polio drops over religious grounds or because of other misconceptions but now it was educated and rich people were also doing it.

The official said the number of people refusing to have their children vaccinated against polio had reduced to 7,000 to 8,000 after hectic efforts.  However, an unofficial estimate puts this number at around 50,000.