Government readies health workers to combat polio

The Jakarta Post, Bandung/Semarang/Sukabumi

Stunned by a polio outbreak, West Java is preparing a massive deployment of health workers to stop the disease and prevent its spread.

The West Java Health Office will deploy some 90,000 health workers throughout the province to combat the outbreak, a senior health official said on Saturday.

Over the course of a month, health workers will immunize over three million infants in the province beginning at the end of May, said Fatimah Resmitai, the head of the environmental health section at the provincial health office.

"The immunizations will be free. Workers will go door-to-door throughout the province so no infant will be left unimmunized," Fatimah said.

The program, launched following the detection of several cases of polio in Girijaya subdistrict, Sukabumi regency, will complement the work of Integrated Health Service Posts (Posyandu).

The posts, which immunize children against different diseases, including polio, were set up in almost every neighborhood in the country during the administration of president Soeharto. However, the posts have cut back drastically on their work since the economic crisis in 1997.

According to a master plan from Jakarta, the 90,000 health workers will be divided into teams of three which will be assigned to different areas of West Java. Each health team will consist of a supervisor, recruited from maternity wards and medical schools in West Java, a Posyandu member and a health officer who will perform the actual immunizations.

Fatimah said the immunization program was in response to the polio outbreak in Girijaya subdistrict, Sukabumi regency. Five infants have so far been confirmed as having polio, while another 13 infants are suspected of having the disease.

In Sukabumi regency, around 4,055 children in the regency's four villages were given polio vaccinations on Friday following the outbreak.

According to head of Sukabumi regency's health office, Buhono Thaha Dibrata, the children were from Cidadap and Girijaya villages in Cidahu district, and Citangkil and Cisaat villages in Cicurug district.

He said that according to data from the Ministry of Health, which sent polio samples to be tested at a lab in Bombay, India, the virus might come from either west, east or central Africa. The ministry, he said, sent the samples on April 23 and received the result on May 2.

"That the polio virus can reach Sukabumi means our people have high mobility. Many people travel abroad, such as to Saudi Arabia to conduct the haj pilgrimage or to become migrant workers. The virus can spread through people, food or things," he said.

Before the outbreak, the West Java Health Office relied on the Posyandu to immunize infants, but has had to change this strategy in response to the outbreak.

"We will no longer wait for the ball. We have to go out and actively pick it up," Fatimah said.

She admitted that the health office "had fallen asleep", with the immunization rate in Girijaya subdistrict only 87 percent this year, though still above the standard imposed by the World Health Organization of 80 percent.

Fatimah said she had no estimate on how much the immunization program would cost.

Separately, a top health officer in Central Java announced on Saturday that no polio cases had been found in Central Java.

Budihardja, the head of the Central Java Health Office, said his office had carried out immunization programs since 1995, when the government launched its National Immunization Program.

He said his office strived for a 100 percent immunization rate in Central Java.