CM Siddaramaiah promises to make state free of measles, rubella by 2020
“India has to sustain its polio-free status until polio is eradicated globally”
Bengaluru: Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has assured the people that by 2020 the state will take strong steps to eradicate measles and rubella. Speaking at the ‘Polio-free celebration event-cum-regional review meeting and consultation’ on Tuesday, the CM gave this assurance after hailing the State’s victory over polio. According to the directives from WHO to the Karnataka Government, by 2020 the state should take steps to eradicate both rubella and measles and start focusing on non-communicable diseases.
Dr Nata Menabde, WHO representative of India at the regional review meeting, said that even though India may be polio-free, the global fight against polio eradication is far from over. Moreover, India also faces the risk of the emergence of vaccine derived-polio viruses although this risk is lower compared to the risk of wild polio virus importation.
“India has to sustain its polio-free status until polio is eradicated globally,” said Dr Nata Menabde, adding that the state government should continue to keep the immune systems of children strong. Meanwhile, research will continue on polio eradication strategies. Dr Nata also stressed future goals, which include sustaining high population immunity against polio through quality polio vaccination campaigns and improved routine immunisation coverage so that there is no relapse. “The current programme priorities include, maintaining laboratory-backed surveillance system for early case detection and being in a state of emergency preparedness with a robust emergency response plan,” sums up Dr Nata.
Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh, WHO regional Director for South-East Asia, said that the member-states of WHO South-East Asia Region are implementing the final and most critical strategy for polio eradication called the Polio Endgame Strategy. This means a risk-free withdrawal of the oral polio vaccine from the programme in a phased manner.
“The first phase of this strategy involves a global switch from the trivalent oral polio vaccine to the bivalent oral polio vaccine in the immunisation programme and the introduction of Inactivated Polio Vaccine (IPV) in the entire country prior to this switch. The immunisation target of WHO South East Asia Region is to introduce IPV in the entire Region by 2015 followed by switch from tOPV to bOPV in 2016,” said Dr Poonam, who said that even though eradication of polio is a matter of great celebration, the focus should be geared towards other vaccine-preventable diseases that are a major cause of death among children and pregnant women globally.