Bauri leads fight against polio

By MAUREEN GERAWA
WE want to work until the last straw,’’ says the Expanded Programme for Immunisation manager Dr Mathias Bauri of the polio campaign currently on in the country.
In the polio campaign, he is often playing the second-in-charge or deputy role to the National Coordinator/Co-Coordinator of the Polio Campaign Dr Sibauk Bieb.
Dr Bauri is fully aware of the enormous strain that the polio campaign has put on the health workers, but he is adamant that the campaign is a blessing in disguise that must be taken advantage of to improve the national immunisation coverage in this country.
He says most provinces had for a long time very low immunisation coverage rates which has put the country’s population (especially children under 2 years of age) at high risk of acquiring preventable diseases such as polio, measles, whooping cough and tuberculosis meningitis (infection of the brain and nervous system).
As EPI manager, the polio campaign comes under his area of responsibility. He and a team of six Papua New Guineans working with the Department of Health to oversee the coordination of the cold chain, effective vaccine management and distribution in the country and now do it also for the polio campaign with the help of consultants engaged in the campaign.
“It is a vaccine-preventable disease so I have to take the lead, making sure that our children within the target group are vaccinated against this disease and make sure that the vaccines are coming and being sent out by Area Medical Store to the provinces on time, not just for the campaign but also for routine immunisation,’’ he says.
As of Dec 7, 2018, the National Emergency Operation Centre had reported 26 confirmed polio cases so far. Dr Bauri says this means that the campaign against polio will continue until the last case has been found and surveillance shows that the virus is no longer present in communities.
“We have another phase (polio campaign) in February and April of 2019, and another in June integrated into the Measles and Rubella campaign.’’
From Central and Madang provinces, Dr Bauri is a medical graduate from the University of Papua New Guinea. He holds a Master in Public Health and Master of Business Administration (MPH-MBA) from the James Cook University in Australia and has also done studies in field epidemiology in India and has a clear understanding of disease and knowledge in disease surveillance and response.
“We are not yet done (with polio campaign) until we see no new cases of confirmed polio,’’ says Dr Bauri. “This can only be done if our disease surveillance system is working really well and the community is sensitised to the polio disease that they report cases to health facilities for proper examination and investigation with good sample collection techniques taking place.”
One of the positives of this campaign is the improvement in the surveillance system not just in Port Moresby but also at the provinces which is keeping a tab on the virus.
“If we don’t find any more cases six months after the last detected confirmed case then we can confidently say the outbreak has come to a closure,’’ he says.
There are two sides of the polio campaign – one is giving vaccine to cover as many children possible, and the other is to sensitise people so they know what polio is and its effects so they report quickly to the health facilities.
In most cases, the health workers involved in the campaign are the same people conducting the routine immunisation activities so in the second National Immunisation Day (NID) that was completed in November, the health workers were advised to do routine immunisation as well at static sites.
“As much as we want our health workers to concentrate on polio to interrupt its transmission, we still encourage them to conduct routine immunisation to prevent outbreaks of vaccine preventable disease like measles, pertussis and other diseases,’’ says Dr Bauri.
Dr Bauri assures that this campaign is led by the Government.
“The Government is taking the lead because this is our workforce and the NDoH is doing the coordination at the national and at provincial level. Most of our government health workers are actually doing the campaign in the fields and also at the national level with support from our community volunteers and international partners.
“Dr Bieb is the co-coordinator and we are giving directions. We are making sure that the consultants work within our guidelines and they understand our system in the provinces and also; they cannot go without the government people knowing where they are going.’’
Despite the enormous task involved, millions of children were vaccinated against polio so far. Dr Bauri says his team will do whatever they can to ensure every child is vaccinated and PNG retains its polio-free status once more.
“We will do it until the last straw. We will continue. Who else will come and help us? We will work until we get back our polio-free status again.’’
In addition, he says it will take everyone to accomplish this task – the health care provider, care-givers, the government, schools, church leaders and congregation, and the entire community. For instance, if vaccines arrive at a health facility and parents do not bring their children for immunisation, the task will not be done.
“We need everyone working together to make sure the children are vaccinated. If one or two of these areas are not active, we will not do it.’’

• Maureen Gerawa is a journalist working at the Department of Health headquarters.