Ministry unveils Sh119m anti-polio plan

By Elizabeth Mwai

The Government has launched a Sh119 million polio immunisation campaign amid cash flow constraints.

But the Ministry of Public Health requires two more immunisation rounds, each at a similar cost, to cover more than two million children targeted in three provinces.

Public Health Director Shahnaz Sharif said yesterday there is money to facilitate the first round.

He, however, added that it was mandatory to conduct three rounds to build strong immunity against the disease.

"Every mother must bring their child aged below five, irrespective of whether they had been immunised before," said Dr Sharif.

House to house

Speaking during the launch of the first phase of the house-to-house campaign, Sharif said they would immunise newborn children to those aged five years. The programme will run from tomorrow until March 25. More than two million doses of polio vaccine will be used.

Polio virus

The first case of Wild Polio Virus Type was confirmed in a two-year-old girl on February 20 in Lokichogio, Turkana North District.

The five-day campaign will be conducted in Rift Valley, Central and Nairobi, which have been scientifically classified as high-risk areas because of population movements.

The disease reportedly came from Southern Sudan into Kenya through the borders.

Head of Kenya Expanded Programme on Immunisation (Kepi) Tatu Kamau said to create barriers of immunity, a synchronised campaign would be conducted in Uganda, Southern Sudan and Ethiopia, where cases had been reported.

Dr Kamau said in Kenya, 42 districts would be covered in the campaign to immunise children against the paralysing disease.

She said monitoring would be done to ensure no child is left out in the process. A team of 2,034 vaccination officials will conduct the exercise. There will be 218 social mobilisers.

The vaccinators will mark the children’s little left finger with an indelible marker and tick the houses to ensure a child is not given the polio dose twice.

"Please, we appeal to the public not to erase the marker since we are using chalk to mark the house to ensure we do not overdose the children," said Tatu.

Success reported

World Health Organisation country representative David Okello said Kenya had done an emergency immunisation campaign within four weeks of the outbreak, whose success was reported as 90 per cent.

Dr Okello said at the time of the outbreak, Kenya’s immunisation had dropped to 60 per cent from 80 per cent.

He said the low immunisation had been attributed to the effects of post-election violence, last year.

Okello added the creation of new district had complicated the provision of healthcare services.

He said in the three-phased campaign, all children in the targeted districts would be captured.

"We encourage mothers to take children for vaccination. It is free and not painful,"said Okello.

 

 

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