PESHAWAR: The United Arab Emirates has agreed to extend financial assistance for anti-polio vaccination in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) for the next 15 months, according to officials.

The UAE government, which has been assisting Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Fata as part of its Pakistan Assistance Programme through army since June 2014, will provide $21 million more to continue the campaign.

Officials told Dawn that UAE was assisting polio immunisation in 11 districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and entire Fata. UAE showed satisfaction over the performance of vaccinators in the campaigns and good reporting by the health department due to which it extended financial assistance, they added.

UAE will implement the programme in three phases of five months each. “A strategy has also been devised by the government to utilise the amount,” officials said.

Will provide $21 million to continue the campaign for next 15 months

The last four UAE-assisted campaigns in Bara tehsil of Khyber Agency and 11 districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in August and September have impressed not only UAE but other donors too, who now want to continue the vaccination with the same devotion and professionalism.

“The last campaign in October 2014 was the only drive after April 2013 wherein the targeted children were immunised,” officials said. The continuation of UAE grant for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Fata have also done away with the dual system of reporting to Prime Minister Polio Cell as well as army. Now the campaigns will be run only through the UAE funding therefore both Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Fata will report to army only.

Earlier, UAE had spent more than $4 million in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Fata but it extended the programme in the wake of discussions that took place with the departments concerned. It was due to UAE’s assistance that vaccination of internally displaced persons from North Waziristan Agency was carried out in Bannu, Lakki Marwat, and Dera Ismail Khan.

“We have vaccinated about 150,000 displaced children from Waziristan which not only protects them but also children in the host districts from polio,” officials said. They added that polio was endemic in North Waziristan Agency because vaccination hadn’t been carried out there owing to Taliban’s ban for the past 23 months.

Officials said that involvement of UAE in the campaign was encouraging in Pakhtuns-populated areas like Fata, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan, which were responsible for 210 cases of the total 236 reported nationwide in 2014. “Pakhtun population has been the worst victim of poliomyelitis as refusals and inaccessibility to children in view of poor security is a hurdle in polio eradication in the area,” they said.

“We have pinned great hopes on it because involvement of UAE is crucial to do away with refusals against the vaccine as it was evident in the past campaigns,” officials said.

They added that the parents, who earlier refused to administer anti-polio vaccine to their children under the misconception that these weren’t permitted in Islam or were laced with some ingredients that caused sterility to the recipients, would respond positively because people recognised UAE as an Islamic country.

Officials said that support of army for the campaigns provided security assistance to them to reach the inaccessible population for vaccination.

“The government has also been persuading the UAE government to extend the programme to Karachi and Balochistan where virus is in circulation,” they said.

Published in Dawn, November 10th, 2014