The health authorities of Peru are carrying out an “intense vaccination sweep” in twelve departments and one province of the country “where it is necessary to increase coverage” to avoid an outbreak of polio, the Ministry of Health (Minsa) reported this Sunday.
The campaign began on July 1 in the coastal departments of Tumbes, Lambayeque, Lima and Tacna, the Andean departments of Arequipa, Moquegua and Puno, and in the jungle departments of Amazonas, Loreto, Madre de Dios, San Martín and Ucayali, as well as in the province of Callao.
The Minsa remarked that polio has no cure, but it is prevented with the vaccine, which is why the free immunization campaign aimed at children under 5 years of age has been intensified.
He assured that the Andean country has not registered cases of poliomyelitis for 32 years and that the objective is to exceed 90% of children under 5 years of age vaccinated against this disease.
On May 25, the Peruvian government declared a health emergency “due to the high risk of an outbreak of poliomyelitis and measles” in the 12 departments and one province of the country indicated and announced that it was going to start a campaign to vaccinate 2.5 million children under 5 years of age against these diseases.
This measure was taken after the National Center for Epidemiology, Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) issued an alert for the intensification of epidemiological surveillance and response to a case of vaccine-derived poliovirus type 1 in a native community of Loreto.
At the end of last March, the health authorities had already issued an epidemiological alert for all health services in the country after a case of acute poliomyelitis was detected in a one-year-old baby in Loreto.
The CDC detailed at that time that the case corresponded to “a one-year-old male infant, indigenous, whose guardians chose to postpone vaccination” against the disease and presented fever, cough and weakness of the lower limbs.
“In the country, the last case of wild poliovirus was reported in the jurisdiction of the Diresa (Regional Health Directorate) Junín in 1991, receiving the certification of a Polio-free country by the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO),” the agency added at the time.
2023-07-23 22:17:02
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