ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Sunday launched the year’s first nationwide drive to eradicate poliovirus from the country.
During the drive which will be running from February 3 to 9, polio drops will be administered to children under five.
Addressing the launching ceremony, the prime minister reaffirmed his government’s determination to eliminate the polio disease from Pakistan.
He said that the national polio vaccination drive would target millions of children in the country to save their future and health.
He hoped that the dedicated teams would work day and night to eradicate the disease, and would reach the far-flung areas and villages, adding these teams would successfully meet the huge national responsibility by utilising their complete energies.
Prime Minister expressing his views said Islamabad, through international partners, also has close coordination with Kabul and hopefully poliovirus will be eliminated from neighbouring Afghanistan as well through mutual support.
The Prime Minister appreciated and thanked international partners, including WHO, UNICEF, and Saudi Arabia for their generous support in fighting fatal diseases.
Earlier, speaking on the occasion, Prime Minister’s Focal Person on Polio Eradication, Ayesha Raza Farooq said over four hundred thousand polio workers, including two hundred and twenty-five thousand women vaccinators, will go door to door to vaccinate children below five years of age in Pakistan.
She said the polio workers will administer polio drops during the seven-day drive starting from Monday.
She appealed to the parents to open the doors of their houses when polio workers come to vaccinate their children to protect them from polio and other deadly diseases.
Polio is a paralysing disease that has no cure. Multiple doses of the oral polio vaccine and completion of the routine vaccination schedule for all children under the age of five are essential to provide children with high immunity against this terrible disease.
Pakistan remains one of the last two countries in the world, along with Afghanistan, where polio is still endemic.
Last year, the country recorded over 70 polio cases, with the virus detected in nearly 90 districts. The first case this year was reported in the Dera Ismail Khan district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
