Around 58,000 Sar-i-Pul children to miss polio drops

SAR-I-PUL (Pajhwok): Nearly 58,000 children in Taliban-controlled areas in northern Sar-i-Pul province would be missed during a five-day vaccination campaign beginning Monday, an official said.

The five-day anti-polio campaign targets around 9.1 million children under the age of five years, the Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) said on Sunday.

Public Health Department Director for Sari Pul province, Dr. Noor Ahmad Ishaqzai, told Pajhwok Afghan News they have been given the target to vaccinate around 156,000 children across the province.

However, he said nearly 83,000 children were missed out during the past vaccination campaigns in Taliban-controlled areas in the province.

But their teams were able to give polio drops to 25,000 children in Taliban-controlled areas but the rest were deprived.

He added no polio positive case had been registered in the northern region of the country but in overall 29 positive cases surfaced across the country and most of them in areas near Pakistan.

He said Taliban militants did not allow polio workers to conduct home to home vaccination, but they allow teams to do so at clinics in their controlled areas.

Earlier, the Taliban had arrested five polio workers and released them after two days in Kohistanat district of the province.

Taliban spokesman ZabiullahMujahid told Pajhwok they had no issue with polio workers, but public awareness programs had problems in some parts of the country.

He said contractors could not implement their project based on their promise and contract.

pk/ma