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KEY new
tool in the fight against wild poliovirus was used for the first time in
December in polio immunization campaigns in Afghanistan. Bivalent oral polio
vaccine (bOPV) is a critical development in the polio eradication effort - a
highly efficacious vaccine able to provide protection against both surviving
serotypes of polio (types 1 and 3) concurrently, effectively delivering
double the benefit in one dose.
From 15-17 December in Afghanistan’s southern regions, 2.8 million children
under five received this ground-breaking vaccine. In conflict-affected
regions like Afghanistan, where accessibility can be limited, the ability to
optimize immunity to both serotypes in one dose helps maximize the impact of
each activity. All endemic countries - Nigeria, India, Pakistan and
Afghanistan - have both type 1 and 3 wild polioviruses circulating.Afghanistan,
for instance, had reported 15 type-1 and 16 type-3 cases in 2009 (as of 15
December), further underlining the potential of a bivalent vaccine to
expedite eradication.
Mr Ahmad Farid Raaid, spokesman for the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan’s
Ministry of Public Health, said the country was “honoured” to carry out the
historic campaign with this new vaccine. “We really are very happy for
Afghanistan to have this achievement of being the first country to use this
new vaccine,” Mr Raaid said. “We are hopeful that the efficiency,
cost-effectiveness, and operational advantages of this new vaccine will help
us quickly see the number of polio incidents come down.”
WHO Afghanistan’s Polio Team Leader, Dr Tahir Mir, stressed that most of
Afghanistan was polio-free, with 28 of the 31 children paralysed in 2009 from
just 13 insecure districts (of 329 districts country-wide). He said with the
virus so geographically isolated, the ability to tackle both types “with one
go and with much better efficacy than trivalent OPV is a very good
opportunity for us”.
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The
vaccination campaign in Afghanistan is financed by the Government of Canada,
the second-highest per-capita G8 donor to the Global Polio Eradication Initiative
with US$260 million in contributions - $7.76 per Canadian.
- Rod Curtis/WHO
Photo:Cornelia
Walther/UNICEF
insert caption: A child in Jalalabad, eastern Afghanistan, becomes one of the
first in the world to receive ground-breaking bivalent oral polio vaccine.
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N 18-19
November, major stakeholders in polio eradication, including spearheading
partners, infected countries and donors, met with the Advisory Committee for Polio
Eradication (ACPE) and developed a list of recommendations for the polio
programme, including the need for real-time, independent monitoring of
campaigns and enhanced routine immunization to reduce outbreaks. In addition,
the re-established transmission areas of Angola and Chad are to be treated
similarly to endemic countries in terms of technical support, given
poliovirus has circulated in these countries for more than 12 months.
The ACPE heard a report from the Independent Evaluation of Major Barriers
to Interrupting Wild Poliovirus Transmission, which provided specific
recommendations for tackling polio in each endemic country and in the
outbreak countries (see www.polioeradication.org for more).
A Programme of Work 2010-2012 to Interrupt Wild Poliovirus Transmission
Globally will turn the recommendations of the Evaluation - and the
programmatic lessons and scientific evidence gathered in 2009 - into concrete
operational and managerial f actions in a final push to end polio. This
includes a major scale-up in the use of bivalent oral polio vaccine (bOPV),
the sustained application of new tactics to improve Supplementary
Immunization Activity (SIA) coverage, increased investment in areas with
re-established transmission, new tactics to reduce international spread, and
greater emphasis on immunization systems strengthening.
- Sona Bari/WHO
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