A six-day anti-polio vaccination campaign is starting on April 23 and will continue till April 28 in Khyber Agency, Mohmand Agency and Frontier Region (FR) of Peshawar under the supervision of surgeons, administration and security agencies. The children will be immunised with Inactivated Polio Vaccine (IPV) and Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV), according to Dr Jawad Habib Khan, FATA directorate of health services.
He said 119248 children between the age group of zero to 23 months will be vaccinated during the campaign. 14710 infants aging between zero to 4 months will be given OPV shots while 104538 children between the age group of 4 to 23 months will be vaccinated with both IPV and OPV.
451 teams have been appointed for campaign including 371 outreach, 78 fixed and two mobile team.
The health official said that IPV is administered in combination with OPV which protects children from polio virus and increases their immunity system for a prolonged period of time. Dr Jawad said that IPV and OPV drive has been remarkably effective in the tribal belt and for the last 20 months, no polio case has been reported. He expressed hope that the current polio campaign would complete two years of maintaining ‘zero polio’ cases in FATA.
The last polio case was reported on July 27, 2016 from South Waziristan. Since then, no polio case has been reported.
Published in Daily Times, April 23rd 2018.
