SANAA, 16 December 2007 (IRIN) - A three-day national anti-polio campaign began on 15 December in Yemen to ensure the complete eradication of the disease. Spearheaded by Yemen's Ministry of Health - with support from the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), the World Health Organisation (WHO) and USAID - the immunisation drive is targeting just over four million children aged five and under.

Ali al-Mudhwahi, director of the family health department at the Ministry of Health, told IRIN that the campaign was planned to coincide with this year's Hajj (Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca) season. He said children are being immunised in Yemen to prevent them catching polio from returning pilgrims who may have become infected during the pilgrimage.

"Many people from polio-endemic countries go to Mecca and mix with other pilgrims," al-Mudhwahi said, adding that the health ministry had received reports of recent polio cases in African countries such as Sudan, Chad, Niger and Somalia - all of which send pilgrims to Mecca.

More than two million people are attending this year's Hajj, according to the Saudi government.

Some 18,000 mobile teams are carrying out the door-to-door anti-polio campaign in Yemen, targeting 2.5 million households throughout the country. Another 2,000 teams are working in fixed centres.

"A distinguishing feature of this campaign is that a four-level supervisory system comprising 4,200 supervisors has been put in place to monitor the work of vaccinators and health workers at the level of the community, districts, governorates and centres to facilitate the work of the teams on a daily basis," UNICEF said in a statement on 15 December, adding that it had procured five million doses of oral polio vaccines, at a cost of US$635,500.

Polio-free country

Anne Marie Fonseka, UNICEF's acting representative in Yemen, said the campaign was important in sustaining Yemen's so far successful efforts to control a serious polio outbreak in 2005, when 479 polio cases were registered in the country.

According to Ghadah al-Haboub, vice-head of the national vaccination centre in the Ministry of Health, Yemen has been polio-free for 22 months.

In order to create more awareness of the disease and the importance of being vaccinated against it, particularly for parents in remote rural areas, Yemen's health ministry has also been disseminating posters, banners and leaflets throughout the country.

maj/ar/ed

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