KARACHI, April 23: Vaccination of children under the age of five against polio in one of the high-risk union councils of Gadap Town in the metropolis could not be started as per schedule on Monday because of a delay in completion of training of the newly hired female community health workers.

The town health officer of Gadap, Dr Khalil Ansari, said the national immunisation days’ (NID) activities in the union council (UC-4) would now begin on Tuesday.

Under a new strategy, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has hired the services of about 90 females from within the union council on a contract basis and their training under a woman expert in polio vaccination activities was completed on Monday, Dr Ansari added.

Like other parts of the country the NIDs commenced for three days in Sindh on Monday with a target to vaccinate about 7.4 million children in Sindh, including 2.4 million children of deserving age living in Karachi, said programme manager of the expanded programme on immunisation Dr Mazhar Khamesani.

He said that in all 21,200 teams had been formed to vaccinate the children against polio.

These included about 17,700 mobile teams, 2,030 fixed teams and 1,456 transient teams and vaccinations started peacefully on Monday in all areas, he added.

In Karachi, Gadap town is marked as a high-risk town in the context of polio virus circulation.

There are four out of 61 high-risk union councils of Karachi in Gadap town and two of them (UC-4 and UC-8) reported one new case of polio each in 2011.

A source privy to the polio activities said on Monday that Karachi, which reported nine cases of polio in 2011, was considered as melting pot of different tribes and cultures, yet most of the polio cases in the city were from Pashto-speaking families mostly living in Gadap town.

According to polio vaccinators and supervisors working in Union Council 4 of Gadap, the union council having a multiethnic population in the shape of suburban clusters off the superhighway along the Lyari River has scant basic facilities such as health, education, water supply, sanitation and paved roads.

Moreover, refusal of public to administer polio drops to their children and non-availability of females for vaccination teams from the union council have been a big problem.

A source privy to the vaccination activities said that now international donors under a revised strategy had selected about 90 females that would be called community health workers living in the union council to work as vaccinators.

The number of female vaccinators has now reduced in contrary to the previous needs of 120 females, who used to be part of the two-member vaccination teams in the union council, the source said.

These females, including Pashto speaking and local residents are required to vaccinate the target children consistently round the month irrespective of declared immunisation days.

The newly listed females may vaccinate at least twice the target children in a month’s time in view of the high concentration of virus in the union council, the source said.

A senior officer said that the WHO would pay about Rs7,000 per month to each of the females who lived in the areas and knew much about the norms and culture of the population in question and as such chances of refusal or harassment to vaccination teams would be eliminated in this way.

Requesting anonymity, a senior health official in the city said that the deferment or delay in the polio activity was now possible as a new national emergency plan against polio had a provision that a polio campaign could be delayed in a particular area for want of preparations.

However, there should be no compromise on the quality of the vaccination and immunisation of children against polio, he added.