Knocking on the doors of households with children, health care workers, and volunteers work towards the eradication of poliomyelitis in the country of Pakistan. Such official polio elimination campaigns have been ongoing since 1994 then why is it that Pakistan is one of the few countries that is a pocket for the deadly virus?
When the other deadly virus of the century started in 2019, officials all over the world felt that Pakistan would be able to get hold of its COVID-19 situation and its impacts as it has a working system of vaccination in place. The poliovirus vaccination infrastructure of Pakistan was lauded by officials in that that the already mobilized network of healthcare workers, deployment system, and technical strategies in place would make COVID-19 vaccination of the public that much easier. Despite the authorities’ claims and relief at the system, many speculate that if Pakistan’s polio elimination system is efficient, why is the crippling virus of polio still found in the country. The Independent Monitoring Board (IMB) for Polio pointed out in a report, “Indeed, many people have spoken of a Covid-19 ‘silver lining’; this references the much better joint working of teams and the dissolution of many organisational and professional boundaries. Specifically, given the rapid mobilisation of the Pakistani government’s response to Covid-19, people have asked: if Pakistan can do it for Covid-19, why can it not do it for polio?” IMB further went on to remark that from 2012 to November 2020, Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) has spent a staggering amount of $1.16 billion in the country.
If Pakistan has not been able to eradicate polio with such massive funding from several international agencies over the last few decades, does it stand any chance to combat COVID-19? Also see how sports will continue after covid-19.
Public’s Distrust of Vaccines
As seen with polio vaccinations, the Pakistani public is mistrustful of vaccinations and it can be attributed to many factors. There is a vociferous troop found in the country that is responsible for propagating conspiracy theories about the vaccines that are foreign-funded. The claim is that some countries in the world are targeting Muslims via vaccinations to either make them infertile or implement the implantation of mind-control chips. Dr. Mohsin Ali, the doctor responsible for gathering data about people’s inclination to receive COVID vaccines showed worry when participants raised questions like, “The uneducated people, they come up with questions about whether it is going to chemically castrate us…. They ask are you going to cause infertility, is it some sort of international conspiracy, are we going to be killed?”
It is not surprising that the public is not keen on trusting internationally produced and distributed vaccines after the CIA masterminded the fiasco of Dr. Shakil Afridi collecting DNA samples door to door to flush out the location of Osama Bin Laden in Abbottabad.
Dr. Ali reports that most of the public holds some form of reservation about the vaccinations as they did with the polio vaccines. He commented that the interviews he conducted during the trials made it clear that the misconceptions that the public holds about vaccines are rampant and regardless of the socioeconomic status of people: “People who are coming in from every walk of life: from a waiter to a bureaucrat to a general; educated and uneducated. All of them have different misconceptions: their own variety.”
Religious reservations play their part in the public’s refusal of the COVID-19 vaccines which was also observed when the polio eradication campaign was started. Some people believe that the vaccine holds remnants of pork which is haram in Islam. Muqaddar Riaz, a volunteer in the COVID-19 vaccine trials, expressed his concern, “I have heard so many things on social media about vaccines, for example, that it’s got pork in it. I have heard it’s a conspiracy, but I don’t know. God knows better.” Fazel Habib, another name in the group of volunteers remarked about the people in his home district of Khyber, “Even still now, people do not believe in polio vaccine so I see there will be challenges.” Fatima Akram Hayat who is a health advisor to the local government rightly expressed her concern, “It’s like a game of Jenga… Everything might be going well. And then there’s one thing that happens or one conspiracy theory that takes hold or one thing we do wrong – and it can all come crumbling down.”
Social media has been wielded as a weapon to spread propaganda by many who are against the COVID-19. One of the distressing effects is that it has convinced people that there is no such thing as COVID-19. As Dr. Qaisar Sajjad, secretary-general of the Pakistan Medical Association observed, “With corona, people are not accepting first that it is a problem. They say it’s a conspiracy, so I think most of the people will not go for a vaccine.” Even the people who believe that COVID-19 exists are reluctant to take the vaccine as the Gallup Pakistan poll revealed in November 2020.
The Politicization of Vaccination Campaigns
All over the world, Pakistan is being celebrated for seeing the lowest numbers of daily cases of COVID-19 as compared to the rest of the world. Dr. Hamid Jafari who oversees the polio eradication for the World Health Organization’s Eastern Mediterranean region commented, “Pakistan would be well-positioned, given its polio assets, to help plan for the rollout of the vaccine.”
If the country is well-equipped then why is it that stats showed the highest fatalities by COVID-19 in 2021 on the 17th of April? The country also saw its highest number of reported cases in a single day which was 6,127. As IMB detected political insincerity when it came to polio eradication in Pakistan, there is speculation among the masses that the Pakistani government is not releasing the real numbers of COVID-19 cases and related deaths. Moreover, it has been observed that the daily percentages of COVID-19 diagnostic tests in the country have dropped dramatically. Local government officials can be seen soaking in compliments showered by world health authorities about Pakistan being able to control the spread of the virus due to “smart lockdown” whilst the stats show that there is not only underreporting of cases, but it also seems that there are some clinics that have been providing fake results. It is the reason why the UAE has restricted its pool of authorized Pakistani labs where Pakistani passengers can get tested and obtain their PCR reports.
The efficiency of the deployment system of the polio vaccine will not be of much help in the rollout of COVID-19 vaccines if the other hurdles are not looked into. If the past of the poliovirus in Pakistan is any evidence, it is will not be far-fetched to assume that COVID-19 will see the same trajectory. As an international health official pointed out, “If you are not going to win the argument about vaccinating your kids against a deadly disease like polio, then it doesn’t bode well for a Covid vaccine.” The public holds its breath waiting for the government to take effective measures and get the country through this crisis but the limited resources, misplaced funds, poor health infrastructure, and public sentiments about vaccines do not bode well.
