LAHORE: During the recent province-wide anti-polio drive, Punjab has reported a significant number of 140,440 children who missed the vaccine dose, out of the targetted 2.2 million, putting a question mark on the efficacy of the polio eradication strategy being pursued by the government.

These “still missed children” could not be traced and vaccinated during the Feb-March polio vaccination campaign under the National Immunisation Days (NIDs) 2022.

The campaign was launched in all 36 districts of Punjab by fielding 150,000 polio workers, including area-in-charges, district and union council supervisors, mobile, fixed and transit teams members.

The issue of the “ still missed children” has been a prime concern for the World Health Organisation (WHO) as medical experts believe that an unvaccinated child poses a risk of transferring the crippling disease to other children in his surroundings.

The WHO director general in a meeting of the Emergency Committee held in February this year under the International Health Regulations (2005) on the international spread of polio virus also expressed his serious concern over the ‘still missed children’ in Pakistan.

The medical and public health experts say that all the environmental samples collected in Punjab have been found negative for the last eight months. They link this progress to the ban imposed on the public movement by Punjab government during the five waves of Covid-19 in the country.

However, the officials say that the next few months are crucial in this regard because along with relaxation in other Covid protocols, the ban on the public movement has also been relaxed, allowing people to travel freely from one district and region to others.

The Emergency Operation Centre (EOC) Punjab, acknowledging the efforts of the polio teams, also expressed concern at the alarming number of the ‘still missed children’.

The EOC says the estimated number of the under-five-year target children for February-March 2022 campaign was 2.2 million.

“The [vaccination] coverage in all districts was 95 per cent and a total of 140,440 of target children are still missed after 5-day campaign which accounts 0.64pc of total children,” reads a report of the EOC Punjab.

It says the percentage of “still missed children” was below 0.75 in 29 out of the 36 total districts of the province.

“The still missed children’s percentage was above 0.75pc in seven districts, including Rawalpindi (1.6), Lahore (1.31) and Sheikhupura (1.0),” the report says.

The report says a total of 106 “lots” in eight priority districts were selected where lot quality assurance sampling (LQAS) activity was conducted. As per WHO sampling standards, a lot comprises 8-10 randomly-picked households and one child each is sampled from these houses.

“The overall pass rate was 84pc for the province. It was reported 90pc in six out of eight districts, including Lahore and Rajanpur,” the report reads.

The NID was preceded by a meeting of Provincial Task Force on Polio Eradication (PTF) which was chaired by Punjab Chief Secretary Kamran Ali Afzal.

Punjab Health Secretary Imran Sikandar Baloch briefed the chief secretary on the campaign’s preparedness and the results.

ECO Punjab Coordinator Syeda Ramalla says the programme will focus on the “still missed children” by establishing health camps across the province.

“We are also improving coordination with the Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI) to access these children”, she says.

Ramalla says there are multiple factors that create hindrances in reaching out to the 100 percent target children. One of the prime factors, she says, has been the frequent movement of the population. The seasonal movement has also been a major issue in inoculation of the target population, she adds.

In many cases, she says, the children move out of the provincial boundaries, rendering them ‘not available’.

Despite all odds, the programme is trying to cover maximum number of children to achieve the required percentage, she says.

Published in Dawn, March 29th, 2022