Setback to Pulse Polio drive

GURGAON, March 3: In a big setback to the Pulse Polio Immunisation PPI programme, around 3,000 confirmed cases of poliomeylitis have be...

GURGAON, March 3: In a big setback to the Pulse Polio Immunisation PPI programme, around 3,000 confirmed cases of poliomeylitis have been detected throughout the country in a survey conducted by the World Health Organisaation WHO in 1998. The WHO report says that 2,274 confirmed polio cases were reported in 1997 and 3,146 cases in 1998.

Uttar Pradesh has the maximum number of 1,255 polio cases followed by Bihar8217;s 278, Gujarat 231, Rajasthan-205, Madhya Pradesh 8211; 165, the report says. 113 cases have come to light in Haryana and 81 in Delhi.

The outbreak of fresh cases in 0-5 age group has dealt a severe blow to the country wide immunisation programme, forcing the central government to conduct an additional round of PPI covering Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. On March 14, the oral polio vaccine would also be administered to kids who fall with in the one lakh population around an infected pocket. A similar two rounds of the PPI would be conducted in October and November this year.

The Pulse Polio Immunisation Programme was initiated in 1995 for the eradication of polio. The fourth round of this programme got completed in January this year. The surveillance system to detect any fresh cases was put into practice in 1997 and it8217;s report has indicated that the polio virus is widespread. The WHO report says that if the routine immunisation coverage would have been 100 percent, this would have ensured that no newborn remained susceptible to polio infection after 1995. The coverage, however has been deficient in many states like Haryana, UP, Bihar, Chandigarh, Delhi, Gujarat, MP, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Karnataka, Meghalaya, Manipur, Nagaland, Orissa, Rajasthan, Sikkim, Triputra and West Bengal where the evaluated OPV-3 coverage in 1996-97 has been below 90 per cent.

Incidentially, Gurgaon district accounts for the maximum number of confirmed polio cases. 35 in Haryana followed by Faridabad where 29 cases have been detected. Civil surgeon, Gurgaon, N. K. Jain said that 31 cases have been detected from the backward Mewat area while four have been reported from other segments of the district.

The WHO has recommended that the polio virus can be controlled by immediate reporting of cases having symptoms of Acute Flaccid Paralysis AFP and undertaking an Outbreak Response Immunisation ORI covering 500 children below the age of five years around every AFP case without waiting for the stool specimen report of the affected children.

Health officials say that the fault laid in the sample survey system used to identify the number of children in the 0-5 years age group. Since the accurate number of kids could not be established many a times, it would mean breaking out of the immunisation chain.