Country to be declared polio-free soon, says WHO

THE country will be declared polio-free if no further cases is reported following the outbreak a year ago, according to the World Health Organisation.
Country representative Luo Dapeng said “no further polio cases have been detected in PNG after one year since it was last detected in October last year”.
Dapeng said it was a huge achievement for the country and its partners who worked tirelessly to vaccinate children, especially in the nine affected provinces. In June 2018, an outbreak of polio was declared in the country. The virus quickly spread causing paralysis in 26 children.
The outbreak was attributed to low routine immunisation coverage for children.
Since then, Health Department secretary Pascoe Kase, the WHO, Unicef and other development partners implemented eight rounds of mass immunisation.
Dapeng said an assessment by WHO and Unicef concluded that the transmission of polio had been interrupted.
“However, due to remaining surveillance and population immunity gaps, it is important to further strengthen the current level of performance (surveillance and routine immunisation) for the next six months before the outbreak is declared closed,” Dapeng said.
He thanked health workers for “the tremendous job”.