Two more children fall prey to polio in Sindh

Two more children in Sindh, one each from the Mirpurkhas and Kambar districts of the province, have been paralysed by the polio virus, polio eradication initiative officials said on Saturday, taking the cases in 2019 to 22 in the province, as the onset of the paralysis in these children was reported in December last year.

In Mirpurkhas, the polio virus was found in a four-year-old girl from Sindhri, Ghroro Sharif Union Council, an official of the Emergency Operation Centre (EOC) Sindh for Polio said, adding that the child’s right upper and lower limbs had been affected.

According to the parents, their daughter had received seven doses of the oral polio vaccine (OPV) during campaigns. but no routine immunisation was done. Officials said an investigation into the actual doses received by the child was going on.

Similarly, in the Miprur Union Council of the Kambar district, a two-year-old girl from Warah contracted the virus, which affected her right lower limb. According to the parents, she had received the polio vaccine on seven occasions. Officials have launched an investigation to ascertain if that is the case.

Urging all parents to give the oral polio vaccine to their children as many times as a team visits their doorsteps during the coming months, EOC officials also called upon them to get their children’s routine immunisation done to save them from childhood diseases.

National Coordinator EOC Dr Rana Muhammad Safdar told newsmen on Saturday that dozens of samples from 2019 were yet to be processed, so the cases from last year may continue to be detected throughout January 2020.

“The current intensity of transmission indicates huge immunity gap that would take some time to be effectively plugged. Realistically, the national immunisation days (NIDs) scheduled in December 2019, and February and April 2020, with a case response and routine immunisation focus in between, can turn the tide by mid 2020,” he observed.

Dr Safdar maintained that the polio virus had been rampant throughout 2019, and besides paralysing children, it was showing up in 50 per cent of the sewage samples collected from across Pakistan. “This poses a real risk and it’s our duty to protect kids from lifelong disability through routine immunisation as well as the door-to-door campaigns,” he added.

“We have just started our battle afresh with the successful December nationwide campaign; first since January 2019 as the April attempt was affected by the unfortunate Peshawar debacle. Two follow-up national campaigns are planned in February and April. Moreover, a special response round will be started in high-risk districts on 13th January 2019,” Dr Safdar said, adding that vaccination of all targeted children in these rounds along with efforts for improving RI coverage could turn the tide by mid 2020.

He observed that collective efforts at all levels were imperative, and urged all parents to proactively vaccinate their children as well as those around them to rapidly plug the immunity gap.

Vaccination against all vaccine preventable diseases, including polio, is available free of charge in government health facilities across Pakistan.

Last month, a five-month-old girl from Karachi had contracted polio when she was in the Dadu district, according to a statement issued by the Emergency Operation Centre (EOC) for Polio in Sindh on Thursday.

Since the date of the onset was December 6, 2019, the EOC said that the case of Fiza Chandio should be counted as the 20th case of the previous year rather than considering it the first case of 2020.

Health officials in Dadu said Fiza’s family is resident of UC-4 of Gadap Town in Karachi – an area which is dubbed as “notorious” for polio cases.

Officials maintained that after a nationwide polio campaign in December, now the EOC would do a case-response in districts from January 13 to 19 in a bid to curb the virus circulation.

This case-response will be conducted in over 702 union councils in Sindh and will target 5.12 million children in selected locations in over 20 districts of the province.

They have also planned campaigns to be carried out until June 2020. The total number of cases in Pakistan in 2019 now stands at 123.

Before the case of Fiza, the last two polio cases in Sindh were confirmed on December 27, 2019, when the EOC disclosed that a seven-year-old girl from Sukkur and 22-month-old boy from Tando Allahyar had contracted the virus.

The 22-month-old boy from Tando Allahyyar was severely affected by the virus and died, an official said.

“The boy from Tando Allahyar had not been well for two weeks with swelling, sickness and vomiting, which are non-polio symptoms. At the end of the two weeks, he had weakness in limbs and was notified as acute flaccid paralysis case but the child passed away.”

PM’s advice to parents

Prime Minister Imran Khan had urged the parents in December to ensure that their children were administered the anti-polio vaccine not only for the sake of their health but also for the nation.

Speaking at the launching ceremony of a nationwide polio eradication campaign in Islamabad, had had pointed out that Pakistan was one of the two countries in the world where polio continued to exist and termed it a “matter of shame”.

“To the mothers who are watching this, I request you to go to the health workers and get your children vaccinated yourselves if they have not been administered polio drops.”

The premier had said that around four million children under the age of five would be vaccinated in the ongoing campaign. “This is important for your children and for our nation as well. We all need to understand that if this disease starts spreading, it would have many repercussions on our country. It would become very hard for our workers who go abroad, for our tourists and businessmen.

Khan had said that now that the economy was improving and the government was promoting tourism, it would be a “stain” for Pakistan if people started to believe that the country was “exporting polio”.

“I am aware that our polio workers have given a lot of sacrifices, militants targeted them, they were martyred. There was a lot of fear but still our polio workers went to remote areas where people thought no one could go. They are heroes of our country.”

He also thanked the donors that contributed to the polio drive and urged special assistant on health Dr Zafar Mirza to pay special attention to the issue. Dr Mirza had admitted that polio “remains a national emergency” for Pakistan.

Speaking at the ceremony, he had said that while the government knows polio’s “epicentre” where most cases are emerging, and from there the disease is being transmitted across the country.