AS a pediatrician in practice, everyday, I remind parents that when polio team comes, they must give an extra dose of polio to their children, even if their child has already received the routine polio doses at my clinic.

Parents from higher socioeconomic class living in Clifton and DHA have been refusing polio drops to their children because they feel that anything from the government is not reliable and that their child has received four doses of polio as part of routine vaccination.

I counsel them about why it is important to give extra doses on Polio Day for herd immunity as well as for eradication of polio from Pakistan so that all children, including their own, do not risk contacting polio from non-vaccinated children.

Over the years, people are willing to give an extra dose of polio on Polio Day. Some of them come a week later to give an extra dose, which does not serve the purpose.

Herd immunity develops when a majority of children under the age of five receive polio drops simultaneously.

I recently read in the press that Assistant Commissioner Syed Ali Asghar, who was just doing his duty sincerely, was removed from service because he insisted on administering a polio dose to a son of director of the excise and taxation department. This is shameful.

Instead, the director should have been sacked for despite being a government employee he was not co-operating with the government in eradicating polio.

The menace of polio can only be eradicated from Pakistan if all children, rich as well as poor, get polio drops on Polio Day.

Dr Mumtaz Lakhani

Karachi

Published in Dawn, June 5th, 2017