LANDI KOTAL: Health workers on Thursday went from door to door in parts of Bara tehsil of Khyber Agency to vaccinate children against polio.
The current vaccination campaign is the second in five years in Bara, which has reported the most polio cases in the country during two years.
The officials said anti-polio drops were administered to children in Alamgudar, Mandai Kas, Speen Qabar, Ajab Talab, Dogra, Al-Haaj Market and Gud Malang, which were previously considered inaccessible for health workers.
The health officials said of the 20 polio cases from Bara last year, 15 were reported in the inaccessible localities.
Last time, health workers had done anti-polio vaccination campaign in the middle of 2013.
The tehsil has been inaccessible since 2009 when security forces launched a military operation against the local outlawed militant groups.
“The door-to-door campaign began in the erstwhile inaccessible localities on February 10 and it is still underway,” Agency Surgeon Dr Rehman Afridi told Dawn.
Prior to the start of the campaign in inaccessible areas of Bara, security forces give clearance to health teams for administer anti-polio drops to children either in a school, in a hujra or at any other protected facility in light of militant groups’ threats to target vaccinators.
Dr Rehman said he was satisfied with the foolproof security provided to his health teams by the local political administration throughout Khyber Agency.
The local administration and health authorities had to suspend polio vaccination in Jamrud when two health workers were shot dead by unidentified gunmen in December last year.
It later imparted necessary training to khasadar and levies personnel for polio vaccination as most health workers, especially schoolteachers, refused to run the campaign over militant threats.
“The current campaign is going on smoothly and we have so far achieved over 90 per cent of our target in Landi Kotal and Jamrud,” Dr Rehman said.
He said the campaign was underway in Ghundi, Sur Kamar, Tabai, Gharheeza and New Abadi.
The agency surgeon said no vaccination refusal case had been reported even in far-off localities, including Malagori, Brag, Alacha, Karamna and Bazaar Zakhakhel.
“The remaining localities will be covered in the next two days,” he said.
The health authorities have formed 336 teams to administer anti-polio drops to 127,000 children in three subdivisions of Khyber Agency.
Meanwhile, Fata Social Sector Secretary Sardar Mohammad Abbas paid a surprise visit to Jamrud on Thursday to oversee the ongoing anti-polio vaccination campaign.
He also visited various wards of Jamrud Civil Hospital and inspected facilities offered there.
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