Triumph on Polio - Something to Cheer about?

Photo Courtesy - The Hindu

Finally India has managed to stop the spread of "Polio" disease in the country. On January 12, 2012, all the news media proudly carried this news of 'Zero' polio case on their front pages. Truly a moment of celebration, achievement and result of 16 years of hardwork.

India's Rs 12,000-crore pulse polio programme has finally shown results with the country being free of polio for one year for the first time ever. India's last polio case was detected in a two-year-old girl in Panchla block of Howrah, West Bengal, on January 13,2011.

Each national pulse polio immunisation round involves 24 lakh vaccinators visiting over 20 crore homes to vaccinate 17.2 crore children under the age of five years. Over 50 lakh children are immunised during each round in UP, Bihar and Mumbai alone. The result was no polio in UP since April 2010 and in Bihar since September 2010.

Experts, however, say it is still a bit premature to celebrate. "High-quality immunisation has to be maintained to guard against re-importation of wild poliovirus from  Pakistan, China and Afghanistan, which had polio outbreaks in 2011."

Source - Hindustan Times

In our own Bengaluru city, the last polio case was detected in 2007 after recording zero cases in 2005 and 2006. Karnataka recorded 71 cases in 1998 but subsequently saw cases drop to zero in 2001 and 2002. However, 36 cases were recorded in 2003 before the numbers dropped again to zero in 2005 and 2006.

Source - Indian Express

Looking at the daunting task to cover 17.2 crore children, the achievement deserves all praise. Very interesting this was  a government's sponsored and executed program. It is a fit example of how to plan and execute a successful nationwide program targeting specific audience. It would be a good research topic to find out the elements of success for such massive exercise.

Personally I remember this event in 1995 December, when the 'Pulse Polio' program was launched. I was at my In-laws place away from B'lore and students from nearby school knocked on the door and reminded to get our daughter the polio vaccination. My daughter was 2-3 months old then. The program was launched countrywide on the same day. The program was very well planned and executed with vast army of volunteers it had fielded. The school children and staff were cleverly used to ensure that every family and every child under 5 years is covered. Students knocked on every door, household and convinced them to get thier child drops of polio vaccination. Every place of public importance was covered - Bus stands, Railway Station, Vegetable Markets, Cinema theaters etc all had the volunteers with Kiosk setup to ensure that no child is left out. Haven't seen such a well planned and a successful execution of a government program.

Even though the target for zero case was not met in 2005 itself but looking at India's demography and vast population, even in 2012 is  a great achievement.

Really a big thank to all those volunteers, workers, planners and mangers for ensuring every child is immunized against polio.