Sindh earns praise for efforts to reach all minors

Islamabad: The federal government has appreciated the efforts of polio teams to reach out to every child for polio vaccination. The praise comes in the wake of the fact that for the first time during the last 18 months, all three environmental samples collected in February, one each from Khamiso Goth, Machar Colony and Sohrab Goth, have indicated absence of wild poliovirus circulation.
In an official correspondence sent by Senator Ayesha Raza Farooq to the chief secretary of Sindh, Ayesha has stated that the recent negative environmental samples from Gadap Town indicate a positive epidemiological development in Karachi.
Gadap Town and other high risks Union Counicls (UCs) of Karachi have posed a serious threat to halting poliovirus transmission. Last year in 2014, Karachi alone reported 23 polio cases from high-risk areas including Baldia, Bin Qasim, Gadap Town, Korangi Town, Orangi Town, Landhi, Liaqatabad, North Karachi, and Site Area. This year, no polio case has been reported from Karachi; 4 cases have been reported from interior districts of Sindh including Dadu, Kambar and Sukkur.
This year, the government of Sindh appears to have made all necessary arrangements to reach unreached children in Karachi, especially in the high-risk UCs, with a special strategy involving local female community volunteers, law enforcement agencies for provision of security cover to polio workers during campaign days, and establishment of health camps in high-risk UCs.
Ayesha has emphasised that it would be critical to carry on and enhance efforts in the super high-risk UCs of Karachi. “At the same time, it will be of utmost importance to achieve high-quality in the SIAs in entire Sindh,” she maintains in the letter.
Currently, environmental samples have been collected from 36 sites of 15 high-risk cities of the country. Samples are also being regularly collected from identified sites in three towns of Karachi (Gadap, Baldia and Gulshan Iqbal), Hyderabad, Sukkur and Jacobabad.