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 The Southeast Asian country is dealing with an outbreak of the
infectious disease. A wider outbreak of polio could set back global
efforts to eradicate the crippling disease, which remains endemic in
only three countries - Afghanistan, Nigeria and Pakistan.
The confirmed cases in the Philippines were caused by
"vaccine-derived" polio rather than the wild type of the virus,
which had been eradicated in the country nearly two decades ago.
"The WHO is gravely concerned about the situation in the
Philippines," Rabindra Abeyasinghe, WHO Philippines representative,
told reporters.
Immunization coverage in the Philippines for oral polio vaccines is
66%, but needs to be at 95%, Abeyasinghe said. Just 40% of children
under 5 have received a polio vaccine by injection.
"If we do the vaccination the way we normally did, and that 30% are
not vaccinated, you are seeing another outbreak in another couple of
years", he said.
The Philippines will roll out next month an immunization program
that will initially target the children in two areas of the southern
region of Mindanao, where the first case of polio was confirmed last
week and where the virus has been detected in sewage systems.
A second case was also recorded last week in Laguna, south of the
capital Manila, more than 1,000 km away from Mindanao.
Eroding trust in vaccines and poor access to healthcare facilities
are among the reasons why Filipino children are not getting
vaccinated, compounding the problems of health authorities already
battling measles and dengue outbreaks.
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The WHO has given the Philippines access to an oral polio vaccine (OPV)
against type 2 of the disease, which the country does not have.
OPVs produced from 2016 no longer target the type 2 strain because
the wild polio virus type 2 has already been eradicated worldwide
since 2015, but the WHO still keeps a stockpile.
The vaccine-derived type 2 polio virus was the strain detected in
the two reported cases, Abeyasinghe said, adding that the WHO and
the United Nations agency for children, UNICEF, would work with the
Philippines to vaccinate more children.
Vaccine-derived cases tend to occur in places with low vaccine
coverage and poor sanitation as people who have been vaccinated
excrete the virus, putting those who have not been vaccinated at
risk of catching it.
Polio is a virus that attacks the nervous system and can cause
irreversible paralysis within hours of infection. Children under
five are the most vulnerable, but polio can be prevented with
vaccination.
The last known case of wild polio virus in the Philippines was in
1993, the WHO said.
(Editing by Jacqueline Wong)
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