Recently, a case of polio, detected in the East Champaran district of Bihar, an Indian state adjoining Nepal´s Tarai area, was found to have originated in Nepal. [break] This has jolted the government whose anti-polio programs seem already tattered following the detection of five polio cases in Rautahat and Mahottari, three of which are indigenous.
"The genetic mapping, which is carried out to find out the origin of each polio case, revealed that the case detected in East Champaram was exported from Nepal," said a government official, on condition of unanimity, adding, "It is a heavy slap on our face. We can no longer accuse India of exporting its indigenous polio cases to Nepal."
The government, proud of uprooting indigenous cases of polio for a whole decade, till 2010 since 2000, had always maintained in the past that India´s success in containing the acute infectious disease in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh was a key for Nepal to eradicate polio disease.
"The Khadi village of East Champaran, where polio was detected, is just five kilometers from Gaur, the district headquarters of Rautahat," said an official involved in the government´s anti-polio program. "This means that it may have dangerously spread within Nepal as well."
Another mop-up
Alarmed with its transcendental form, the government has decided to carry out another mop-up against polio. However, in the new mop-up program, the government will administer polio vaccines to children below five years of age in only eight districts in the Tarai.
According to Krishna Bahadur Chanda, immunization program chief at the Child Health Division, the two-day mop-up program will kick off on September 18 in Saptari, Siraha, Sarlahi, Dhanusha, Rautahat, Mahottari, Bara and Parsa districts. Earlier on August 14 and 15, an extended mop-up was carried out in 18 districts including Kathmandu.
Public health experts say that only vaccination is not an adequate measure to eradicate polio. An integrated approach, which includes nutrition and sanitation program, is also required to effectively fight the disease. But, the government has been focusing only on vaccination program so far overlooking what experts say.
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