Nearly one million children below the age of five are likely to miss the anti-polio drive as health authorities declared the launch of the province-wide campaign on Sunday. Polio vaccination teams will not visit Hangu, Chitral and Swat districts of the NWFP, as well as Kurram and Orakzai agencies, during the three-day drive that begins on Monday.
While polio teams have been prohibited from visiting Hangu and Swat and the two agencies for security reasons, Chitral has been excluded from the current drive due to unfavourable weather conditions.
Vaccination: The health officials said around one million children in the restive districts and agencies would not receive anti-polio drops/vaccine during the current campaign, which was being conducted after fears that the disease was re-emerging, following encouraging signs of its elimination in 2005.
An alarming 118 polio cases were registered in the previous year, compared to only five in 2005. The officials said a total of 53 polio cases, the largest in the past four years, were found in the NWFP in 2008.
Kicking off the three-day campaign, Health Executive District Officer Dr Mohammad Ali Chauhan said 2008 was the worst with regard to their polio eradication drives, both for the province and Peshawar.
He said security concerns, the presence of Afghan refugees and the increasing number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) were the main reasons behind the rise in polio cases in Peshawar.
Dr Chauhan said the areas of Mattani and Adezai had also been excluded from the current drive for security reasons. He said about 1,000 children in these areas would not receive polio drops during the drive.
The doctor said nearly 800,000 children would be administered polio drops in Peshawar during the current campaign by 1,800 teams under 301 area supervisors.
He said the refusal cases, which were earlier nearly 7,000, had now been restricted to 1,000 only. Chauhan admitted that P-3 type polio cases had increased in Peshawar during the previous year.