WHO team leader for polio eradication in Punjab, Dr Raul Bonifacio said this while addressing a seminar on "Poliomyelitis- the Endgame Strategy", here at the University of Health Sciences (UHS), here on Friday.
Dr Raul Bonifacio maintained that this year, total number of polio cases has increased to 50 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) and 66 across the country as compared to 12 cases in 2018 and eight cases in 2017.
"During the current year, six cases have been reported from Sindh and five each from Balochistan and Punjab," he said.
Dr Bonifacio said that survey shows that parental/community refusal of polio vaccination is not because of religious issues; doctors are opinion leaders in most of the communities in Pakistan who are needed to show their commitment to eradicate the crippling polio disease besides improving their diagnostic skills. He pointed out that risks to Pakistan span beyond the areas where the polio cases were reported and a determined focus on delivering high quality campaigns that ensure finding and vaccinating every missed child is critical to stop virus circulation.
WHO Surveillance Officer, Dr Ujala Nayyar said that anti-vaccine propaganda had been an issue in Pakistan. She said that immunization programme is using a combination of inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) and Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV) to boost individual immunity of children (aged 4-23 months). Combining OPV and IPV provides stronger protection against polio. IPV strengthens immunity in the blood while OPV strengthens immunity in the gut. She said that cases of children up to 10 years of age had also been reported in Pakistan, she added.
UHS Registrar, Dr Asad Zaheer called for bridging the gap in training facilities and procedures to improve clinical diagnosis of Acute Flaccid Paralysis (AFP) which is the main symptom of polio.