Minister for National Health Services Regulations and Coordination Saira Afzal Tarar said the government was taking immediate measures to eradicate polio from the country.
Replying to a question in the Senate, the minister said a total of around 862 million doses of Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV) were administered to children under 5 years of age, across Pakistan, through the National (NIDs) and Sub-National (SNIDs) supplementary immunisation activities conducted during the last three years adding that Pakistan and Afghanistan were still on the list of polio-hit countries.
Most polio cases were found in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) but the KP government, she said, had made effective efforts to eradicate the virus and their performance in this regard was satisfactory.
The minister said all children less than 5 years of age were reached through a door to door campaign in which all villages and houses were covered adding that the nationwide campaign involves around 85041 mobile and 5125 transit teams, and a total of 6697 fixed sites support vaccine and logistics for the activity. The fixed sites provided vaccination services during the campaign to children across the country, she added.
She said micro plans were worked out at the union council level in order to reach every village adding that teams comprising two members each were guided about their daily work and route to be taken under the micro plan. Adequate arrangements were being made to cover all villages targeted during a particular campaign, she informed.
She said the polio teams consisted of volunteers and officials from the health, education and security departments and hoping that children who could not be vaccinated during the previous campaigns for non-availability or refusal would now be vaccinated. The record, she said, was updated accordingly adding that the fourth and fifth days of the campaign were utilised to cover the remaining children.
She urged the community influencers and religious leaders to play their role in dealing with the polio vaccine refusals in order to make the drive successful. She informed that around 223,000 personnel were deployed in every nationwide campaign including 19,211 area in charges, 9,792 UC medical officers, 85,041 mobile, 9,995 fixed and 5,125 transit teams.