KARACHI, Jan 22: EDO health Dr Ali Nawaz Sheikh is confident that polio will be eradicated from Karachi this year.

He was addressing town health officers of the city in a meeting held on Tuesday in connection with the polio eradication campaign to be launched from January 28.

The EDO informed the meeting that no polio case had been reported in Karachi since 15 June last year, despite the high-risk period from August to December.

He said Karachi received an aggregate success rate of 95% in the seventh polio eradication drive in October. He said the 8th campaign was specially for Gadap, Malir and Gulshan-i-Iqbal towns.

He said that more about 5000 teams had been formed in the 18 towns. He directed the THOs to be extra cautious during the current drive when Karachi was approaching the status of a polio-free city, as a large number of people belonging to Southern Punjab, Ghotki, Sukkur, Larkana and abroad frequently visited the city increasing the chances of polio spread.

Talking to PPI, Dr Ali Nawaz Sheikh said polio is a communicable disease which usually strikes a child within five years of age.

He said three polio cases were reported in Karachi last year, two of them were among Afghan settlers of Gadap Town, but one case was reported in a well-to-do family living in New Karachi Town.

This was also the first polio case in Karachi among the permanently settled residents during the last couple of years, the EDO said and added that it was mainly due to careless attitude of elders towards the polio eradication campaign that many children were left without being administered polio drops .

“Since there are no symptoms of polio, people usually do not take the disease seriously and most of the drop-administering teams meet discouraging response from parents,” he said.

He said that according to a study about 200 children could get infected in the area where one case was detected. However, based upon the success rate of the last many campaigns, the EDO expressed the confidence that polio would be eradicated.

Pakistan is among the three worst polio-hit countries, the other two being India and Nigeria.—PPI