When Gaza reported its first case of polio in a quarter century in late August, there was a swift effort taken by health officials to provide polio vaccines to the region and prevent further spread. The effort was led by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, a group of national governments and partners, including the World Health Organization (WHO), Rotary International, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), Gates Foundation, and Gavi, the vaccine alliance. So far, the effort has been successful, with nearly 560,000 children vaccinated.
In the midst of the Israel-Hamas war, healthcare workers and volunteers have successfully vaccinated 558,963 children in Gaza. The effort is to be carried out in a series of rounds, with the first having taken place from September 1-12. During this 12-day round, a novel oral polio vaccine was administered to children with the help of health facilities and mobile vaccination teams.
Pivotal to the success of the campaign was a nine-hour humanitarian pause, agreed upon by all sides, to allow healthcare workers to administer vaccines to the area’s children. This ceasefire was advocated for by the WHO, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). The groups are continuing to call for ceasefires to allow for further vaccination.
The success of the next round of vaccinations, scheduled during a planned ceasefire in October, will depend on the adherence to the ceasefire, as well as on the stability of infrastructure. This includes hopeful minimal damage to healthcare facilities and transportation and population movement as communities continue to flee war-torn areas.
Currently, 65 monitors are being sent into vaccinated areas to calculate an accurate and unbiased picture of the proportion of children actually vaccinated by this effort. This data will help inform how to best approach round two of the campaign in different areas of Gaza.
By Sarah Ortega