These teams will be stationed across both urban and rural settings to ensure comprehensive vaccination and to address immunity gaps among vulnerable children
By our correspondent
LAHORE: In a robust effort to eradicate polio, the Punjab government is set to launch a geo-tagging initiative during its upcoming anti-polio vaccination drive, beginning Monday. This initiative is part of a broader national campaign aimed at vaccinating over 23.3 million children under the age of five across Pakistan. On Saturday, the provincial task force on polio eradication convened to finalize strategies for the drive, with a significant emphasis on vaccinating children from migrant families at entry and transit points throughout the province.
The initiative will deploy special teams tasked with ensuring vaccination coverage, particularly for children traveling through high-risk areas. To bolster these efforts, Punjab’s Health Department has mobilized a substantial workforce comprising 4,888 permanent vaccination teams and an additional 2,654 transit teams. These teams will be stationed across both urban and rural settings to ensure comprehensive vaccination and to address immunity gaps among vulnerable children.
The urgency of this initiative is underscored by recent developments in polio cases across the country. Pakistan’s Regional Reference Laboratory for Polio Eradication at the National Institute of Health (NIH) confirmed the detection of the country’s 41st polio case for 2024 on Friday. The wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) was found in a child from the Loralai District in Balochistan, marking the first confirmed case in this region for the year. This child exhibited symptoms of paralysis on October 8, contributing to a troubling increase in cases nationwide. To date, 21 cases have been reported in Balochistan, 12 in Sindh, six in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and one each in Punjab and Islamabad.
