By: Nyima Sillah
After the discovery of Polio type 2, The Ministry of Health with partners Monday, 15th November, disclosed its readiness to begin a massive Polio immunization campaign across the country starting from 20th to 23rd of November, 2021 with a targeted figures of over three hundred thousand children.
Speaking at the press briefing held at Central Medical Drug Store in Kotu, Toshiko Takahashi, UNICEF Representative, said an outbreak of polio virus type 2 in The Gambia does not come as a surprise since polio outbreak was earlier reported in the neighbouring country of Senegal.
She said an outbreak of poliovirus type 2 in any given country is a siren call that immunity level in the affected communities has become increasing low.
“The only way to stop the transmission is through vaccination using oral polio vaccine. An outbreak like this threaten to undo decades of progress achieve by the Ministry of Health supported by UNICEF, WHO and all partners in polio eradication program in The Gambia,”
“In 2021, January to September polio 3 coverage is 64% its commitment to the global polio eradication goal. The recent confirmed polio outbreak is a call for every one of us to work together and persistently to arrest the situation as soon as possible,” she added.
Meanwhile, Dr. Ifeanyi Undenweze WHO Representative affirmed that The Gambia has confirmed 10 cases from environmental samples this year. Adding that, all the cases reported from The Gambia were from the environmental samples and no confirmed cases in human.
“The objective of the supplemental immunization activity (SIA) is to stop the outbreaks with two drop of polio vaccine to children under 5years of age this will interrupt the transmission of the virus. There is no cure for polio, it can only be prevented, polio vaccine given multiple times, can protect a child from polio virus life,”
“WHO has contributed about GMD9, 000,000 to the training and movement of about 1,666 personnel as vaccinators, supervisors and monitors that would be distributed throughout the country to supervise and monitor the campaign.”
However, Sidat Fofana, Director of Health Services at MOH, added that, this year is going to be interesting because they are going to have polio vaccination at the same time sensitize people to get Covid-19 vaccination.
