PESHAWAR, April 16: The directorate of health services Fata and Unicef on Monday organised a workshop to sensitise political and assistant political agents of the federally administered tribal areas to the recurring cases of polio in the region.

Speaking on the occasion, secretary social sector Fata Dr Aftab Durrani called upon the Fata administration officials to take lead in the polio eradication programme in their respective agencies and initiate efforts on war footing to root out the menace from the region.

Director health services Fata Dr Fawad, deputy director EPI Fata Dr Shoaib, deputy director EPI Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Dr Jan Baz Afridi, programme specialist Fata Dr Rafiq, prime minister’s focal person on polio Dr Imtiaz, health officer Fata Dr Qayum, communication for development officer Shabnam Afzal, media officer Shadab Younas, and others were present on the occasion.

Mr Durrani urged authorities to contribute toward polio eradication programme by owning it and to take exemplary action against officials found negligent. He said the political agents should work as agents of change and should put polio eradication on their priority list second only to maintenance of law and order in their agencies.

“We have to stop transmission of polio virus by July 2012,” he said, adding it was one of the targets set in the augmented National Emergency Action Plan (NEAP) launched in November 2012 by the government to wipe out polio from the country.

Dr Aftab said the situation in Fata was different due to precarious security situation besides other issues like inaccessibility and mobile population and therefore special efforts were needed to address the matter.

He went on to add that security situation was improving gradually in Fata and hoped that it would yield positive results in terms of polio eradication in the volatile region. He also asked the participants to involve Fata based NGOs in the polio eradication drive.

Director health services Fata Dr Fawad Khan, while spelling out the objectives of the event, asked the political agents to own the programme and show their commitment to meet the NEAP requirements.

Programme specialist Fata Dr Rafiq made presentation on the communication aspects of Polio Eradication Initiative (PEI) and apprised the participants of the social mobilisation activities supported by the Unicef.