Already, more cases this year than in 2017

The Independent Monitoring Board’s latest report makes frightening reading, because it says that Pakistan’s Polio Programme had fooled itself into thinking it had made any progress since 2017. Released in October last year, it is only now that the PM’s Focal Person on Polio, Babar Bin Atta, has announced that its recommendations will be implemented. It is also very bad news that the poliovirus can be detected in the sewers of Karachi, as well as in other large cities.

Pakistan must not only persuade Afghanistan to stop blaming Pakistani sewerage for taking the virus into its territory, but must stop doing so itself. Then there is the problem of vaccination coverage. Too much is made of the poliovirus in sewage, and not enough of the resistance to vaccines among many people, supposedly for religious reasons. The failure to get local figures committed to the eradication programme meant that too often, the target population found foreigners working. This gives the false impression that the programme is part of a foreign conspiracy against local peoples.

It is also noted that politicians and government officials are not seen in the drive in Karachi, and after the starvation deaths in Thar and the HIV epidemic in Larkana, the Murad Ali Shah government seems to be courting another public health disaster. Before such a disaster strikes, it is essential that the report’s recommendations be implemented. As one of only four countries left where polio occurs, Pakistan has a special responsibility, to all Mankind, to ensure its eradication from its soil. For that, it cannot allow any slackness. The tendency to abandon the programme at the least sign of resistance, which was seen when vaccinators were attacked, must be countered. Only a truly vigorous vaccination programme, backed intellectually by a vigorous awareness programme, and physically by the law-enforcing resources of the state, will provide the necessary impetus. Otherwise, Mankind will remain threatened by an outbreak of a dreadful, crippling, disease. Already, 21 cases have been reported this year, which more than 2017 (12) and 2018 (8) combined.