PESHAWAR, June 29: The district coordination officers (DCOs) and executive district officers (EDOs) of the health department may face the axe for showing slackness in the upcoming sub-national three-day polio immunisation campaign beginning on Tuesday.

According to sources, the NWFP provincial health department, on the pattern of the Sindh health department, could swing into action against the DCOs and EDOs by placing them under-suspension for their failure to ensure completion of vaccination and emergence of polio cases in their respective areas.

Mardan, Peshawar, Nowshera and Swat have been declared high-risk areas by the health officials. “This is what the government can do to win appreciation from the donor organisations who generously supported the campaign,” the sources said.

“The ministry of health has decided to send in a request to the National Reconstruction Bureau, seeking empowerment of provincial director-generals of health of all the provinces to write the annual confidential reports of EDOs in view of their role in the polio campaign,” they added. They feared that it would arm the provincial health departments with immense administrative power and they would start removing and appointing EDOs at their will.

Recently, the Sindh government removed five EDOs and served show-cause notices on others after detection of polio cases in their areas. The provincial health department, the sources said, could follow the Sindh government. The proposed move had put the officials under pressure in the districts where polio vaccination had not been up to the mark during the past several drives.

“Dismissals, transfers or show-cause notices will not serve the cause of polio eradication. This could blow a setback to the anti-polio efforts, because fearing the action by government, EDOs would resort to hiding new polio cases,” they said. The Nigerian government had employed similar tactics to do away with the endemic of polio there after which the responsible health officials began to conceal new cases in their bid to avoid being taken to task. The same could happen here, they said, adding that weakness surrounding polio campaigns in some districts could be identified and handled technically to produce results.

Health ministry in collaboration with the UN agencies is starting vaccinating about 17 million children below five years of age in 48 districts of the country. The entire Sindh province has been bracketed high-risk region. Pakistan has recorded 15 positive polio cases this year with Sindh taking the lead with 10 followed by the NWFP with three and Balochistan two cases.