Over 110 million (mn) children under five years of age were vaccinated against polio over three days in India following the Polio National Immunisation Day (NID) on 31 January 2021.
While 91 mn children were vaccinated at booths on this decade’s first ‘Polio Ravivar’ (Polio Sunday) on 31 January across all states and UTs, over 19 mn were vaccinated during house-to-house vaccination drives over the next two days. The house-to-house mop-up rounds will continue for up to five days to identify and vaccinate children who missed getting vaccinated at the booths.
President of India Mr Ram Nath Kovind had launched the NID Pulse Polio campaign for 2021 by administering polio drops to a child less than five years old at Rashtrapati Bhawan on 30 January 2021.
Vaccinations were conducted at close to 700 000 booths which were staffed with around 1.2 mn vaccinators and 180 000 supervisors. The countrywide drive was supported by technical partners and volunteers from WHO, UNICEF, Rotary and other civil society organizations.
Children were also vaccinated at bus terminals, railway stations, airports and ferry crossing to vaccinate children in transit to ensure no child misses the life-saving dose of the polio vaccines.
The polio vaccination drive was conducted along with COVID-19 vaccination drive, under which over 4.1 million health care workers and other priority groups have been vaccinated till 2 February.
All measures have been taken to ensure safety during the times of the pandemic by maintaining COVID-19 appropriate practices, such as preventing overcrowding at booths, maintaining physical distance of 2 metres, wearing masks, washing hands and administering polio drops in well ventilated-settings.
Polio (poliomyelitis) mainly affects children under 5 years of age, with 1 in 200 infections leading to irreversible paralysis. Among those paralysed, nearly 5% die when their breathing muscles become immobilized.
In 1988, the Forty-first World Health Assembly adopted a resolution for the worldwide eradication of polio. It marked the launch of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI), spearheaded by national governments, WHO, Rotary International, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, UNICEF, and partners like the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.
Vaccination has led to cases due to wild poliovirus decreasing globally by over 99% since 1988, from an estimated 350 000 cases then, to 160 in 2020.
The Pulse Polio Immunization Programme was rolled out in India on 2 October 1994, when India accounted for around 60% of the global polio cases. The last polio case in India was reported a decade ago in Howrah on 13 January 2011, and the country has been free of polio.
India received a ‘Polio-free certification’ along with the entire South-East Asia Region on the 27 March 2014.
Wild polio virus cases continues to be reported in neighboring Pakistan and Afghanistan. As long as a single child remains infected, children in all countries are at risk of contracting polio. Failure to eradicate polio from these last remaining strongholds could result in as many as 200 000 new cases every year, within 10 years, all over the world.
India continues to hold one NID and two Sub-National Immunization Day (SNIDs) for polio every year to maintain population immunity against wild poliovirus and to sustain its polio free status. To provide additional protection, the Government of India has introduced the injectable Inactivated Polio Vaccine into its routine immunization programme.