5.8 million children to get polio vaccine drops in Sindh

Around 5.8 million children under the age of five will be vaccinated against polio in Sindh during a seven-day vaccination drive commencing on Monday, officials said on Saturday, adding that around two million children would be given oral polio vaccine (OPV) in Karachi.

“The Emergency Operation Centre (EOC) for polio in Sindh will launch a polio campaign from 24th Jan to 30th Jan 2022, as part of the sub-national immunisation days, to give oral polio drops to around 5.8 million children of under five-year in the Sindh province,” an official of the EOC Sindh announced.

The campaign would be conducted in 20 high-risk districts of Sindh, inclusive of all districts of Karachi with a target of more than two million children, the official added.

In 2020, as a result of the pandemic, the gap in campaigns from March to July coupled with routine immunisation being affected left an immunity gap in children which we have been addressing through back-to-back monthly polio campaigns since August 2020 and have controlled the spread of the virus throughout 2021.

“Thanks to these campaigns, Sindh has not reported a single case of polio since July 2020 and environment samples are also negative, which is good for the program and the future of the children of Pakistan. If we continue with the same momentum, we will further see significant results, but we must not get complacent and continue the hard work,” the EOC official added.

“We understand that communities in the super high-risk UCs for polio need other services and we are addressing this through new initiatives. We have opened water filtration plants, experimental dispensaries, model EPI centres, mother and child health facilities and doing health camps in underserved areas throughout the province among many other initiatives.”

The polio eradication initiative official maintained that while dealing with the pandemic, people must also deal with childhood immunisation to prevent childhood diseases, the benefits of vaccination are clear as frequent campaigns have significantly reduced the burden of polio across the country.

Children can be saved from childhood diseases like polio, measles and typhoid through vaccination and the media should help to raise awareness regarding this, he added.

Pakistan is one of the two polio-endemic countries in the world along with Afghanistan and has so far reported a total of one polio case in 2021.