DERA ISMAIL KHAN: Unidentified gunmen killed a security official in Bajaur tribal district as he was returning from his polio duty on Monday.
The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Emergency Operation Center (EOC) moved to launch a three-day anti-polio campaign in the tribal region from Monday under tight security to vaccinate 913,193 children under the age of five.
“Vaccination of children crossing into tribal districts in polio high-risk areas is our priority to prevent the polio virus from entering tribal districts,” said provincial coordinator EOC Mahmood Aslam Wazir.
The anti-polio campaign will last three days, followed by a catch-up of missed children to ensure that no child is left unvaccinated.
However, in North Waziristan, Khyber and South Waziristan tribal districts, the campaign will be conducted from Monday till Friday, followed by a catch-up of missed children.
The wild poliovirus has been found in Bajaur through environmental sampling, but Wazir urged the teams to vaccinate every child coming into Bajaur and all the tribal districts.
He said all the teams will go beyond the call of duty to implement the Polio Eradication Initiative activities to navigate the campaign to success.
“In the entire tribal districts, 913,193 children below the age of five will be vaccinated with oral polio vaccine by a total of 3,971 teams, comprising 3,666 mobile teams, 216 fixed and 89 transit teams,” he added.
The teams, he said, will also administer vitamin A capsules to a total of 829,997 children. Of these, Blue Vitamin A capsules will be administered to 92,222 children between the ages of six and 11 months and red Vitamin A capsules will be administered to 737,775 children between 12 and 59 months old.
“No case emerged in tribal districts for around 26 months because of the cooperation of parents/caregivers, the relentless efforts of frontline workers, the support of partners and commitment of higher echelons,” Wazir observed.
Tribal elders said that concerted efforts are direly needed from the authority to eradicate the life-threatening disease in the entire tribal region bordering Afghanistan.
Musa Kaleem, a tribal elder from North Waziristan, said tribal people are ready to extend all-out cooperation to the visiting teams vaccinating their children for a better tomorrow.
“There is no hindrance to the anti-polio drive. Our people want to protect our children from a lifelong disability,” he said.
However, Monday’s tragic incident, in which a levies personnel deployed with an anti-polio team was fatally shot, has once again demonstrated how difficult it can be to stop the virus from circulating in the remaining few pockets of tribal districts.
Soon after the attack, the authorities cordoned off the area and launched a search operation to catch the miscreants trying to scuttle their campaign against the dangerous virus.
Meanwhile, Dr. Nadeem Jan, a technical focal person, urged parents and caregivers to continue cooperating with Sehat Muhafiz (polio workers) when they knock on their doors to “be part of making history by the complete eradication of polio and stopping its transmission in tribal districts.
“We need to maintain performance with the same determination and diligence until eradication is achieved,” he said.
The EOC said that tribal districts have completed two years without any polio case in the region as of July 27 this year.
Polio is a contagious viral illness that in its most severe form causes nerve injury, leading to paralysis, breathing difficulties and sometimes death.