KP to lead country to polio-free status

PESHAWAR: A senior government official has said the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa would lead the country to polio free status.

Talking to the visiting Chairman of Technical Advisory Group (TAG) for Polio Eradication Initiative (PEI) Jean Mark here on Friday, Chief Secretary Muhammad Azam Khan said the said the provincial government was committed to eradicating the virus and enacted law making immunisation mandatory.

He assured the visiting TAG chief that efforts against polio eradication would continue unabated and change in the government would not affect the efforts in this regard.

The chief secretary thanked the TAG chairman and other partner organisations for their support to eradicate the virus.

Commissioner Peshawar Fakhr-e-Alam said that Peshawar was declared as a conveyor belt two years back by Independent Monitoring Board (IMB) but due to the hard work of the teams and the district administration it had reported no polio case in the past two years.

Jean Mark appreciated the performance of the Peshawar team, saying that it had done a wonderful job by bringing down the number of cases and stressed on keeping up the current momentum till the case count was brought to zero as complacency was not an option at this stage of the programme.

He said Peshawar remained the priority since it was the transit route that was frequented by Afghan refugees.

Secretary Health Abid Majeed said that the number of staff had been increased to address the lacunas in the existing service delivery system and to strengthen the routine immunisation across the province.

Meanwhile, Chairman Technical Advisory Group (TAG) for polio Dr Jean Marc Olive has said that “Fata progress towards polio eradication is appreciable and it should try to maintain this level of performance.”

In a meeting, chaired by Coordinator EOC Fata Muhammad Zubair Khan, held at Emergency Operations Centre Fata here, he said, “We are getting close to ultimate goal of polio eradication and Fata has made tremendous progress during past couple of years but it need to remain vigilant as virus is still circulating in areas around Fata.”

He emphasised the need for consistent efforts to focus on and sustain the quality of anti-polio campaigns in Fata.

Coordinator EOC Fata Muhammad Zubair Khan, on the occasion, informed the participants that proactive engagement and coordination with political administration and security agencies had made it possible to reach out and vaccinate children in Fata.