Local support sought to boost fight to tame polio

EVERY member of the community needs to guarantee the security of the polio vaccination campaign, an official says.
And the safety of health workers and resources would need everyone’s support – from leadership level all the way to individual level, said Sibauk Bieb, the Health Department executive manager public health and national coordinator for polio response.
“This campaign is coming to help and save us, our children, they are for us and we have to assist the team to get the job done in a peaceful environment,” Bieb said.
“We need to ensure that our community leaders at LLGs and wards responsible for one or two villages talk to their community members to provide security for our health workers.
Polio has no cure and is a virus that causes lifetime paralysis. The only way to avoid it and infection is through immunisation.
Bieb was speaking at an NBC Press Club event at the Lamana Hotel, in Port Moresby last week. He was reacting to a recent rape case of a health worker in Morobe while she was helping conduct polio vaccination in the area.
The polio vaccination campaign is now into its second phase in Morobe, Madang and Eastern Highlands. Enga, Chimbu, Western Highlands, Jiwaka, Hela and Southern Highlands had their first round completed on Sunday.
In the first round, three provinces had more than 3000 children under-five years old immunised, which was a figure over the targeted 85 per cent. World Health Organisation had recommended the target.
More than 700,000 children under five in those nine provinces have been immunised.
A confirmed case of polio was revealed in Port Moresby over the weekend, bringing the number to 10 confirmed cases in the country.
The government declared a Public Health Emergency on June 26.