KARACHI:Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah said Thursday that Sindh province reported a polio case in Karachi in 2018, which was a historical low for the province and no case had yet been reported this year, however, all six districts of Karachi were being classified as districts of high risk for which they have to take strict measures to bring the menace at zero.
He declared polio vaccination mandatory in all public and private schools and added that the schools which dared to refuse immunity against polio would be liable to strict actions.
This he said while presiding over a meeting of Provincial Task Force For Polio Eradication here at the CM House. The meeting was attended by Provincial Health Minister Dr Azra Pechuho, Chief Secretary Mumtaz Shah, Principal Secretary to CM Sajid Jamal Abro, provincial secretaries of education, finance, health, local government; divisional commissioners.
The chief minister was told that globally, Pakistan and Afghanistan were the only remaining countries with polio. In 2019 so far, Pakistan has one polio case from Bajour while one case has been reported from Afghanistan. In 2018, Pakistan reported 12 cases, including six in KPTD, two in KPK, three in Balochistan, one each in Sindh and Punjab.
In Sindh, all six districts of Karachi are still classified as `Tier 1’ core reservoir, that is district of high risk. The chief minister said that it was something to be worried of but “we would take drastic measures with proper planning and focus,” he said.
It was pointed out that in 2019, no polio case was reported from Sindh, however, last year one polio case was reported from Karachi’s Gadap area. The virus has been isolated from environmental sites (taken from sewage system) which indicated ongoing virus transmission.
Giving presentation to Sindh Chief Minister, Provincial Coordinator EOC Umer Farooque Bullo said that post campaign monitoring had revealed that 96 percent children had been vaccinated from September 2018 to Jan 2019.
He disclosed that in January, 201,9 88,472 children were not at home while 86,863 children refused to take the vaccine. At this, the chief minister expressed displeasure and said that out of 7.3 million children, 175,00 were missed (refusals and not present at home) which was not a big deal, but even then, they could not tolerate this refusal.
He directed the chief secretary to take drastic measures so that nobody could dare to refused to immunize his child.
The World Bank representatives appreciated the performance of the Sindh government as saying that the chief minister was holding regular meetings; therefore, the divisional and district administration was taking effective part in the campaign.