Injectable vaccine included in Sindh’s anti-polio programme

Karachi
A marked decline in the incidence of polio in Sindh has convinced international monitoring bodies and the provincial health department to devise a more focused and targeted approach for the eradication of polio by introducing Injectable Polio Vaccine (IPV) in the Expanded Programme of Immunisation (EPI).
This was announced by the Sindh health minister Jam Mehtab Dahar on Wednesday while addressing a ceremony held to mark the induction of IPV in the Sindh EPI.
He said it was due to the concerted efforts and hard work of all relevant stake holders that just only one polio case was reported so far this year.
“The last polio case in Karachi was reported in October 2014,” said Dahar. “To prevent the recurrence of more cases, we have decided to increase immunity levels among children through the injectable vaccine. IPV will be given to susceptible children, in addition to continuing with the coverage of oral polio vaccine which enables herd immunity.”
Dahar said the eradication of polio virus from the local environment had emerged to be the most important priority in this regard, because Pakistan was the only other country besides Afghanistan where polio cases were still surfacing from time to time.
Last year, a total of 29 polio cases were reported from Pakistan while around six cases were reported from Afghanistan.
Hence, he said, the Sindh health department with close collaboration of the World Health Organisation and Unicef had ensured training of thousands of doctors, besides paramedical and technical staff, to ensure the administration of IPV to children in the province.
The minister said the endeavour to help attain zero prevalence of polio virus in Sindh has been made with absolute political commitment at every level.
Also speaking on the occasion, Sindh health secretary Saeed Ahmed Mangnejo said the department had done all the work to provide logistics and other facilities to make the launch of IPV a success.
The team leader of WHO, Dr Tamaskan, said the new vaccine had reduced the incidence of polio cases in many countries.
She said Sindh too now showed remarkable improvement, with only one case reported this year in February.
A representative of Unicef, Dr Amjad Ansari, said Sindh was the second province in Pakistan to have introduced IPV in the province.
Other officials present on the occasion included Sindh EPI chief Dr Mazhar Khamisani, special health secretary Dr Riaz Memon, health director at Karachi Metropolitan Corporation Salma Kausar.