Polio vaccination campaign targets 5.3 million Afghan children in 16 provinces

The Ministry of Public Health of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA), said Sunday the first round of this year’s polio vaccination campaign is being rolled out in 16 provinces of Afghanistan and aims to inoculate 5.3 million children.

Dr. Sharafat Zaman Amar, the spokesperson of the ministry, in a message to the media, said that in this round of the campaign, 5.3 million children under the age of five will be vaccinated in 178 districts in the eastern, southern, southeastern and western parts of Afghanistan, including Kabul.

Zaman added that this campaign will start on Monday, January 23 and will continue for four days.

“In 2022, only two positive cases of polio were reported in Paktika and Kunar provinces, which shows a significant decrease compared to 56 cases in 2020 and four cases in 2021,” Zaman said.

Meanwhile, Qalandar Ebad, Minister of Public Health, added: “Afghanistan is closer to eradicating polio than ever before. We hope that by the end of 2023, with the successful implementation of the planned polio vaccination campaigns, we will see zero cases of polio in Afghanistan.”

Ebad asked parents, religious scholars and tribal elders to cooperate with vaccinators throughout the country to implement the polio vaccine.

This campaign will be carried out by the Ministry of Public Health with the financial cooperation of the World Health Organization (WHO and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in parts of Afghanistan.

According to the Ministry of Public Health, during the last year, nine rounds of nationwide and sub-regional polio vaccine implementation campaigns were launched in Afghanistan, which had a good result in controlling the circulation of the polio virus.

This comes after the World Health Organization announced the ongoing efforts to eradicate polio in Afghanistan and said that overcoming polio in this country would be a global victory.

According to this organization, as long as polio exists in one place, this disease will remain a threat everywhere.