Vaccinating 2 million children against polio

More than 2 million children under the age of five will be vaccinated against the crippling polio virus next week in southern, southeastern and eastern Afghanistan, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said this week in the Afghan capital, Kabul. The three-day campaign, which begins on 7 May, follows reports of a sixth polio case this year in the southern province of Kandahar, the health ministry has said. The Afghan Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) supported by UNICEF and the World Health Organization (WHO), are spearheading the campaign. More than 15,000 health workers are due to travel house-to-house in 11 provinces - Kandahar, Helmand, Nimroz, Zabul, Urozgan, Ghazni, Paktia, Paktika, Khost, Nangarhar, and Kunar, UNICEF said in its statement. UNICEF’s representative in Afghanistan, Bernt Aasen, urged families in the 11 provinces to make their children available to receive the vaccine next week. "Polio immunisation is an essential way of safeguarding children’s health, and preventing this crippling disease from affecting their lives," he said. "But unless we eradicate polio in Afghanistan, the virus will continue to threaten development, disabling children, placing greater strain on families, and adding to the pressure on national health resources," Aasen noted. Commenting on the recent cases of polio identified in Kandahar in April, Aasen said: "The new cases we have seen may be a result of improved monitoring and surveillance put in place by health authorities." The systematic immunisation of children against a range of diseases such as polio, measles, diphtheria, whooping cough and tuberculosis is essential to long-term improvements in child health. UNICEF estimates that more than 600 children under the age of five die every day from mostly preventable diseases. Afghanistan is one of just four countries in the world still affected by polio. The others are: Pakistan, India, and Nigeria. Two months ago, Egypt was declared polio-free after sustained successful immunisation efforts, UNICEF said. Poliomyelitis (polio) is a highly infectious disease caused by a virus. It invades the nervous system and can cause total paralysis in a matter of hours. It can strike at any age, but affects mainly children under three (over 50 percent of all cases). The virus enters the body through the mouth and multiplies in the intestine.