KABUL (SW) – The Ministry of Public Health has announced that it has started the first sub-round of door-to-door polio vaccination campaign until Thursday.
Sharaf Zaman Amarkhel, the spokesperson of the Ministry of Public Health, has said that in this round, more than five million children under the age of five will receive vaccines in 16 provinces.
“The administration of anti-polio vaccine for more than 5.3 million children under the age of five in 178 districts of 16 provinces in the eastern, southern, southeastern and western regions of the country, including Kabul, has started this week and will last until Thursday.”
At the same time, a number of families have welcomed the implementation of the polio vaccine, saying that the implementation of this vaccine will save their children from paralysis.
The campaign to deliver the polio vaccine has started in 16 provinces, while several vaccinators have been killed in different provinces in the past year and a half. Now, however, the officials of the Ministry of Public Health have assured that they have coordinated with the security forces to ensure the safety of the vaccinators.
A number of religious scholars believe that administering anti-polio vaccine to children is effective.
Abdullah Ehsani, a religious scholar, said: “The application of anti-polio vaccine is permissible from the point of view of Sharia, and our suggestion to respectable families is to definitely vaccinate their children against polio, and this is for the benefit of our families and society.”
According to the information of the Ministry of Public Health, the implementation of nine sub-campaigns against polio vaccine in the last year, has been able to reduce the incidence of this disease among children, and in 2022, only two cases of polio, one in Paktika and the other in Kanar, were registered.
It should be mentioned that Afghanistan and Pakistan are the only countries where polio has not been completely eliminated.
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