Government set for a 5-day polio vaccination campaign

By Daniel Dembede 

The government through the Ministry of Health will this week launch a five-day polio nationwide vaccination campaign.

The campaign which is targeting about 4 million children in 9 high risk counties, will run from Wednesday, October 02 to Sunday, October 06, 2024.

Speaking during a media stakeholder meeting in Nairobi on Monday morning, Public Health and Professional Standards Principal Secretary (PS) Mary Muthoni said there is an outbreak that requires urgent national attention.

She said five new cases have been reported in the country in the near past. Four of them, she added, have been reported within the Kakuma refugee camp, while the 5th case was reported in Nairobi.

“The four cases in Turkana County are attributed to an outbreak in neighbouring countries, and thus may have been brought by an influx at the camp,” she stated.

“The fifth case in Nairobi has been traced through environmental surveillance, where key laboratory stakeholders collect samples from sewerages between 5am and 7am daily. Through tests, it was found out that there is an active case in Nairobi’s Kamukunji area,” added the PS.

Nairobi, Machakos, Kiambu, Kajiado, Turkana, Busia, Bungoma, Trans Nzoia and West Pokot have been identified as key counties for the vaccination campaign, targeting children aged under five years.

Consequently, PS Muthoni said the polio vaccination will go hand in hand with Social Health Insurance Fund (SHIF) registration, which will be primarily done by Community Health Promoters (CHPs).

According to the PS, the 107,000 CHPs countrywide will have a registration radius of 100 households each, and where there are registration challenges, they’ll refer the cases to existing National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF) centres for assistance.

 This drive, jointly being carried out with the ministry of interior, has so far registered 2 million people, ahead of the National Health Authority (SHA) official roll-out on Tuesday.

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