Thousands of children vaccinated against polio

A weeklong door-to-door anti-polio drive in the Central African Republic ended on Saturday. The nation-wide campaign follows the outbreak of two cases of a deadly form of "wild polio" in June 2004 in the northern prefecture of Mambere Kadei. Health workers vaccinated approximately 3,000 children, the director of preventive medicine in the ministry of health Dr Abel Namssenmo told IRIN on Monday. The Ministry of Public Health and Population organized the campaign, in conjunction with the UN Children's Fund and the UN World Health Organization. The campaign was to administer the final second dose of the anti-polio vaccine. The first dose had been administered in November and December of 2003. Children in three principal towns cut off by the war did not get their first dose until May. For the latest campaign, health officials trained some 1,500 local volunteers in proper methods of administering the vaccine. The government loaned 1,000 bicycles to volunteers sent to areas with poor transport links. To address a misconception amongst parents in CAR that the vaccine could harm their children, health workers marked the finger of each vaccinated child with nail polish, Namssenmo said. Volunteers would go door-to-door verifying which children had been vaccinated and encouraging parents of unmarked children that the treatment is safe. In addition to the vaccine, the health workers also provided chewable capsules of vitamin A, Namssenmo said. Many rural people are deficient in the vitamin, he added.