Polio eradication: Time to join hands against crippling disease

PESHAWAR
Every day, 30-year-old polio victim Junaid Ali is pushed in his wheelchair by his father to a nearby playground in their village, Dheri Ishaq, Nowshera district for a change.
While he enjoys watching children play football and cricket, Junaid can only observe from the sidelines, a poignant reminder of the toll that polio has taken on his life.
Contracted at the tender age of three, Junaid’s encounter with the polio virus left him paralyzed, rendering him unable to walk and dependent on others for support.
“Whenever a ball rolls close to me, I instinctively reach for it, but I often fall,” Junaid shares, his eyes reflecting both the joy of the game and the frustration of his limitations.
His father, Jamsheed Ali, recalled the heart-wrenching moment when doctors delivered the devastating news that his younger son could not walk for his entire life as both of his legs were severely affected by the polio virus.”
For 25 years, Jamsheed has made it a routine to take his son to the playground, leaving his work in the fields to fulfill Junaid’s simple desire to feel the joy of being around other children.
“Polio is paralyzing our future and if we do not act today, more Junaid would fall prey to the crippling disease” he told APP with tears rolling down over his face.
This year, so far 40 polio cases were reported in the country including in Khyber Pakthunkhwa where a latest positive case of WPV-1 was recently detected in a two and half years child at Dara Adamkhel in Kohat.
The KP health department officials told APP that 139 cases were reported in 2011 in Pakistan including 23 from KP, 33 from Sindh, 73 from Balochistan, one in Giligt Baltistan (GB) and nine in Punjab.
In 2012, polio cases were slashed to 38 including 27 in KP, four each in Sindh and Balochistan, one from GB, and two from Islamabad. Further reduction in cases had been witnessed during 2013 with 28 cases in Pakistan including 11 from KP, 10 from Sindh and seven from Punjab.
The country had witnessed a sharp increase in polio cases in 2014 after deduction of 127 cases including 68 from KP, 30 from Sindh, 22 from Balochistan and seven from Punjab. In 2015, a total of 38 cases were detected in the country including 17 in KP, 12 in Sindh, seven in Balochistan and only two from Punjab.
As many as 18 cases reported including eight each from KP and Sindh and two from Balochsitan in 2016. One case was detected in KP, two in Sindh, three in Balochistan and one each from GB and Punjab during 2017. Likewise, two cases detected in KP, one in Sindh and three in Balochistan during 2018.
However, significant increase in polio cases were witnessed in the country with a record 134 cases including 80 in KP, 30 in Sindh, 12 each in Balochistan and Punjab during 2019. As many as 82 cases reported in Pakistan including 20 in KP, 22 in Sindh, 26 in Balochistan and 14 in Punjab in 2020. Once in the spotlight in the world for being a country of polio virus reservoir following reports of about 20,000 cases per year in early 1990, there was a great hope that Pakistan was going to be declared a polio free country after a report of one case from Balochistan on January 27, 2021.
However, the report of 40 cases this year from Pakstan had showed that wild polio virus (WPV-I) was still circulating and its eradication was imperative to save children from permanent disabilities.
Senior children specialist, Government Satellite Hospital Pabbi Nowshera, Dr Riaz Khan said polio was a highly contagious disease that mostly invades the nervous system of malnutrition children and spreads through feco-oral route.
Talking to APP, he said infections leads to permanent paralysis and its victim can’t even move parts of his body and even caused death.
He said that over 100 million children were immunized every year before their first birthday and about 24 million under one-year age i.e. 20 percent were deprived of vaccines due to various reasons including refusal in world.
Terming the anti-polio vaccine is a safe option, he said the vaccines prevent two to three million deaths every year and can save an additional two million children subject to improvement of global coverage.
“The oral polio vaccine (OPV) and inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) are weakening and killing poliovirus as the former saved over five million children from permanent paralysis,” he said.
He said WPV-II and III types of polio were eradicated in 1999, and that the last case of type-III was reported in 2012.
After a report of 350,000 polio cases from 125 endemic countries in 1998, he said the World Health Assembly met and expressed strong resolve to eradicate polio from the globe and today the entire world except Pakistan and Afghanistan were declared polio-free.
“The main reason behind the report of surge in polio cases was refusal of vaccination by parents, misconception and high rate of illiteracy,” he said.
He said an inclusive mechanism was put in place for monitoring of vaccinators through incharges at union, tehsil and district councils besides provincial and national levels.
The jirga comprising notables, religious scholars, doctors, EPI officials and district administration are being arranged from time to time to remove misconception regarding polio vaccination in KP.
He said eradication of WPV-I was still a big challenge due to the security situation in Afghanistan and efforts were underway to stop transmission of WPV-I in the pandemic region including its reservoirs.
Dr Riaz said an inclusive mechanism was put in place for all-aged vaccination at Pak-Afghan borders.
He said the cooperation of religious scholars, media, politicians, LG representatives and tribal elders were imperative to tackle the challenge of refusal cases.
In response to surge in polio cases, he said that a nationwide polio vaccination campaign is set to begin on October 25 on Friday aiming to immunize over 4.5 million children across Pakistan.
He said the campaign will be executed in three phases, starting with Sindh province. The first phase is scheduled to commence on October 25 in Sindh, followed by the second phase on October 28 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa while third phase will begin on November 11 in Punjab, Balochistan, and Islamabad.
He said the drive aims to vaccinate more than 2.3 million in Punjab, 1.6 million in Sindh, 730,000 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and 265,000 in Balochistan.
Additionally, 461,125 children will be vaccinated in Islamabad, 740,000 in Azad Kashmir, and 281,232 in Gilgit-Baltistan, he said. Meanwhile, Chief Minister Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Ali Amin Gandapur appealed to the general public to never boycott the anti-polio drive under any circumstances as such practice will put the future of our children in jeopardy.
In next polio Immunization campaigns, he said areas where the anti-polio drives were not carried out for some reasons, will be targeted.
The road to polio eradication requires a unified approach, one where every individual recognizes their role in safeguarding the future of children.
The hope is that with sustained effort, no child will have to endure the debilitating effects of polio, and stories like Junaid’s will become a part of history.