Over 6.2m kids to be vaccinated against polio as campaign gets underway in KP

PESHAWAR: Minister for Health and Finance Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Taimur Saleem Jhagra has said that protecting children from incurable disease of polio is of utmost importance for the government and there was no going back on the commitment regarding polio eradication till the menace was wiped out of the region.

He said this while inaugurating the September round of National Immunization Days (NIDs) in the province here Thursday at Basic Health Unit (BHU) Gulshan Rehman Colony, Peshawar.

Coordinator EOC Abdul Basit, representatives of World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, BMGF and Health Dept were also present on the occasion.

Speaking to media on the occasion, Taimur Saleem Jhagra said that every campaign is a golden opportunity to immunize children under five against polio and stop virus transmission in the last endemic region.

He said the province had made a good progress in the war against polio with zero polio cases reported from the province, adding that sustainability of the current laurels will need a lot of efforts and dedication from the team

The provincial health minister held an appeal to the parents to cooperate with teams by vaccinating their children to protect them from lifelong disability and by helping the government reach the finish line purging the entire globe of the crippling virus.

Briefing the media, he said: “All necessary security and logistic arrangements have been made to ensure smooth conduct of the anti-polio campaign starting from September 17, 2021 in the entire province.”He said that over 40,000 law enforcing personnel were deployed with teams to ensure safety of the frontline workers who are visiting door to door to vaccinate children against polio.

He reiterated strong political commitment for polio eradication saying that the government was leading the public health programme from the front at all levels.

Taimur Jhagra said that due to ownership of the government, the number of polio cases have dropped significantly in the country and hoped that soon the virus would be stamped out of the last endemic region. He said that over 6.2 million children would be vaccinated against polio, for which 30340 total teams have been constituted out of which 27253 were mobile teams, 1857 fixed teams, 1078 transit and 152 roaming teams.

For effective supervision and quality of the campaign, over 7361 area in-charges will be deployed across the province, he added.

He said that every campaign is a chance to reach the finish line, adding that the support of parents and caregivers was very important and without it, the teams would not be able to vaccinate children who are susceptible to contracting the disease.

Meanwhile, upgraded security measures were taken for the polio vaccination campaign that started in different districts of the province on Friday. Children under the age of 5 are being vaccinated during the campaign. Police across the province have taken measures to ensure foolproof security to the polio vaccination teams.

A few policemen had come under attack during and after the polio campaigns in some parts of the province in the past months. Many policemen have sacrificed their lives while providing security to the polio teams in different areas of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in the past years.

During the current campaign, 290,000 workers are going house to house to vaccinate children below the age of 5.

In Peshawar, over 4,500 policemen have been deployed for the security of the vaccination teams. Policewomen were also deployed for security to assist the male colleagues.

“Policemen have been deployed to strengthen the entry and exit points to the provincial capital during the campaign. Besides, the cops have been deployed for the security of the polio teams as well as basic health units,” Capital City Police Officer (CCPO) Peshawar Abbas Ahsan told reporters. The CCPO during the visit to different areas inspected the security measures for the vaccination campaign.