Polio epidemic is on the rise in state

NEW DELHI: The number of children crippled by the polio epidemic in Uttar Pradesh continues to increase steeply with the latest reports showing 347 cases of paralysis and a spillover into Delhi as well.
Officials say the numbers are bound to increase as blood samples are still being analysed for confirmation. In Delhi as well four children have been found to be paralysed due to polio.
Scientists, who have been carefully doing a mapping of all polio cases, say that these cases are genetically similiar to the ones detected in UP Transmission from UP has also been tracked to cases this year in Bihar, Gujarat, Haryana and Maharashtra taking the cumulative total for the country to 407 cases so far.
In UP, almost 50 of the 70 districts are under the grip of this epidemic, despite an intensive drive for the past several years, to eradicate the polio virus. The worst-hit district, Azamgarh, has 36 cases of paralysis in children due to polio.
Union family welfare secretary, JVR Prasada Rao, who feels efforts to eradicate polio would be considerably delayed now, blames the poor coverage of children under the pulse polio vaccination programme in UP for the epidemic. ‘‘Fifteen per cent of the houses have simply not been covered,’’ he says. In Azamgarh, officials say over 40 per cent houses with children were not included in immunisation drive at all.
Union minister for health and family welfare Shatrughan Sinha met the chief minister in Lucknow on Monday to express concern over this rapid increase in polio in the state. Senior officials from the Union health ministry as well from the state were present at the meeting. UP accounts for 62 per cent of the global burden of polio.
Last year a total of 483 cases were recorded globally to which India contributed almost 85 per cent. Even two traditional reservoirs — Bangladesh and Congo have managed to become polio free. The only other countries with high-intensity polio cases are Nigeria, Niger, Pakistan and the conflict-ridden Afghanistan.