Global Polio Board says ‘more needed’ to end polio in Pakistan
June 11, 2021
Islamabad: The Polio Oversight Board of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) has called upon the PM’s Special Assistant on Health to strengthen government leadership of the Polio Eradication Programme by appointing senior officers of the Ministry of National Health Services to the National Emergency Operations Centre (NEOC) for Polio Eradication; ensure regular engagement at the NEOC, and participate in review meetings with provincial Chief Secretaries and Ministers of Health following Supplementary Immunization Activities (SIAs).
Visiting members of the Polio Oversight Board the highest decision-making body in GPEI concluded an important meeting here in Islamabad, offering strategic direction to Pakistan’s future efforts for polio eradication with a set of recommendations encompassing three key stakeholders the government of Pakistan, GEPI partners, and the NEOC.
Islamabad : The Polio Oversight Board of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative has called upon the PM’s Special Assistant on Health to strengthen government leadership of the Polio.
By Pakistan is no stranger to fighting battles against health emergencies; it has danced an arduous and painfully slow dance with the menace of polio. And now it finds itself, like the rest of.
Polio this week as of 12 May 2021
Format
The GPEI has released the 2021 National Emergency Action Plan (NEAP) for Afghanistan which contains the current epidemiology and situational overview and progress on the 2020 NEAP among other contents.
The latest issue of the newSpecial magazine features an article titled “Experience in eradicating polio helps COVID-19 response” which details the role that polio workers have played in fighting the pandemic. The article is available here on page 34.
Last week, the GPEI and UN Foundation together with the UK and UAE Missions to the UN in New York hosted a high-level dialogue looking at the intersection of gender and immunization. The panelists made recommendations on championing women & girls in immunization, drawing on the polio programme. Watch the recorded discussion here.
Publication Date TAG emphasizes the vital role of [the] One Team approach in achieving the eradication goals and highlights the critical importance of fully integrating operational and communication strategies and activities. In its virtual meeting, held March 17, 18, and 20 2021, the Technical Advisory Group (TAG) recognised the challenges faced by the Polio Eradication Initiative (PEI) in Afghanistan, including co-circulation of both wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) and circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 (cVDPV2) in the context of a deteriorating security situation across the country and the spread of COVID-19 around the world. In the midst of such challenges, TAG notes resilience in maintaining core programme functions, political commitment at the highest level, and continuing courage of the programme s frontline workers (FLWs), who have been subjected to violence.