Afghanistan: Taliban launches annual polio vaccination drive

The Taliban administration of Afghanistan has announced that it will launch an annual vaccination drive for millions of children for polio. This marks the second year the Taliban has launched such an initiative since retaking Afghanistan in 2021.

The Afghan health ministry said on Monday that it was launching the second annual polio vaccination drive aiming to reach nine million children in the country that have yet to be inoculated. Afghanistan and its neighboring Pakistan are the only two countries where polio is endemic. While the disease has virtually been eliminated all over the world, efforts for polio vaccination in Afghanistan and Pakistan were hindered by insecurity, inaccessibility, mass displacement, and suspicion of external influence.

Since the Taliban took over, many more areas could now be reached for the vaccination campaign as when the insurgent group retook control of Afghanistan. The fighting has since stopped, according to Afghanistan’s National Emergency Operation Center for Polio Vaccination director Nek Wali Shah Momin. The EOC is under the health ministry and includes international organizations such as the World Health Organization and the United Nations children’s agency.

Even as the Taliban has barred many women from attending universities and participating in aid work, Momin said there were also women helping administer the vaccines in the campaign. Momin said women were important to be able to reach children who are often at home with their female caregivers who were usually not comfortable interacting with male vaccinators.

Momin noted that in areas that required vaccination teams to travel longer distances, authorities required the women administering the vaccines to be accompanied by a male colleague. Momin said they recruited and trained male family members of the women to join in the vaccination campaign.

Over the weekend, the Islamic State militant group claimed responsibility for a bombing that took place in Mazar-i-Sharif in the Afghan province of Balkh last week. The attack killed one security guard and wounded five journalists and three children. The militant group said its fighters detonated a parcel bomb inside a Shia center as a rally was taking place to reward journalists who were working in agencies involved in the war against Islamic State.