PESHAWAR, Sept 3: An edict issued after a meeting of Ulema and experts brushed aside rumours about any harmful effects of polio vaccine and urged parents to get their children immunised against the crippling disease.

“The drops are safe and no anti-fertility agent, including oestrogen and progesterone, are added to it at any stage of its manufacturing process nor any such agent is present in the final product,” said the edict announced by a meeting of Ulema and experts held at the Peshawar Medical College here on Sunday.

The principal of the Peshawar Medical College, Dr Najeebul Haq, told the meeting, which was jointly organised by the WHO, Unicef and the health department, that polio affected 350,000 children annually since 1988 in 125 countries, mostly those inhabited by Muslims.

Due to vaccination, the number of polio-affected countries had now been brought down to only six, including Pakistan. During the last 18 years since the launching of the global campaign, five million children have been saved from getting paralysed.

He said that rumours about the drops containing oestrogen and progesterone had caused immense damage in Nigeria and India, adding that the rumours were aimed to portray that Muslims were a great hurdle in the campaign against polio.

He said that Pakistan had recorded 25,000 cases of polio in 1994, 558 in 1999, 28 in 2005, and 12 this year so far.

NWFP Health Minister Inayatullah Khan, health experts, policy makers and representatives of donor agencies said that the drops were procured by UN agencies, particularly by Unicef, and met the specifications set forth by the International Expert Committee on Biological Standardisation (ECBS).

“These specifications make it impossible for oestrogen and progesterone to contain any other undeclared biological active substances such as viruses, hormones or other arterials,” he said, adding that the WHO was verifying whether manufacturers of oestrogen and progesterone used in the global polio eradication campaign had met international ECBS specifications.

Senator Prof Khurshid Ahmad, Maulana Mehmood Ashraf Usmani, Mufti Ghulamur Rehman, Maulana Syed Naseeb Ali Shah, Mufti Munibur Rehman, Hafiz Hasan Madani, Qari Rohullah Madani, Dr Attaur Rehman and others signed the edict.

The WHO country chief, Dr Khalife Mahmud Bile, said that during the last 17 years more than 10 billion doses of polio vaccines had been provided to more than one billion children globally, adding: “No side effects have been reported during this period.”

He rejected rumours by saying that its vaccine was totally safe and did not contain any sterility-inducing ingredient. “No side effects have been reported during the last 18 yeas,” he said, adding that the vaccine was produced under the technical supervision of UN agencies.”

He said that the rumours were actually meant to harm Muslims and were meant to show to the world that Muslims were actually responsible for the delay in global efforts for eradication of polio virus.

He said that several Fatwas had been issued by prominent Muslim scholars on polio vaccination, adding that they included the grand Imam of Jamia Al Azhar, head of the International Union of Muslim Scholars, the Mufti of Egypt, Dr Yousuf Al Qaradawi, and several prominent scholars from Pakistan, Syria, Lebanon, Iran, Egypt, Qatar, Oman, Mauritania, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.

He said that these Fatwas made it clear that parents would be committing a major sin if they did not protect their children against polio by having them vaccinated.

Among other participants at the meeting were Dr Abdul Jabbar, WHO’s PEI NWFP and Fata, Dr Azhar and Dr Aiman Abdulaban of the Unicef, Secretary Health Abdus Samad Khan, Director General Health Dr Jalilur Rehman, WHO Operations Officer Dr Mohammad Saeed Akbar Khan, Dr Rehan A. Hafiz, National Programme Manager EPI, and Deputy Director EPI NWFP Dr Waheed Khan.