By Theckla Gunga – EMTV News, Port Moresby
Community health workers in Komo LLG in Hela Province will start collecting statistics of children that will be vaccinated against the Polio virus. This will take two days and the team is prepared to kick off the vaccination on Wednesday, March 13. Team leader of the polio campaign in Komo, Charles Tiamai, says health workers from the three health centres in Komo will be working together to ensure all children are vaccinated in this round.
The campaign for the fourth vaccination for children under 15 years old in Komo has gone far and wide. Health workers at Komo are expecting a good turn out when they start the fourth vaccination round come Wednesday.
The vaccination will cover children in the Hides 4 area, Komo, Para and Juni communities.
The Polio outbreak in Papua New Guinea was first recorded in 2018 with a total of 26 reported cases, including the death of a nine month old baby. This comes after 18 years of free polio in Papua New Guinea.
Since last year, the World Health Organisation and Global Polio Eradication Initiative have teamed up with the national and provincial health authorities to control the outbreak. The aim is to vaccinate 3.5 million children in PNG against the polio virus.
For Hela Province, the villagers are scattered away from each other, thus the success of the polio campaign depends largely on how far the awareness goes.
