Highlight of National Polio Emergency Operations Center Retreat with High Risk LGA's.

Nigeria's Polio Emergency Operations team held a two days technical retreat on 16^th and 17^th January, 2014 in Kaduna State, to strategies  and develop LGA specific operational plans on how to interrupt the transmission of Wild Polio Virus during Low transmission season which is a huge opportunity  for Nigeria to finally Eradicate Polio  in 2014
(See Nigeria's  Low transmission Season Priorities - 2014)

The meeting was chaired by the Honorable Minister of Health – Professor Onyebuchi Chukwu, other dignitaries at the meeting include: the Chairman of Board NPHCDA (Alhaji Bashar Aminu Iyan Zazzau), Executive Director NPHCDA (Dr. Ado Muhammad), Nigeria’s Chief Consultant Epidemiologist (Dr. Akin Oyemakinde), Director of the Nigerian Centers for Disease Control (Professor Abdulsalam Nasidi), representatives of Developmental Agencies from the WHO (Dr. Paskal Mkanda), UNICEF (Dr Boubakar Dieng), US. CDC (John Vertefeuille), Rotary (Mrs Kemi Lawanson).

Other participants are; Program officers working in 44 Very High Risk LGAs in 10 states, which are Low performing  and still at high risk of transmitting the Wild Polio Virus’s. 

These include:  Executive Secretaries of State Primary Health Care Development Agency, State Immunization Officers, Incident Managers, State Directors of Primary Health Care, Local government Primary Health Care Coordinators, Local immunization officers, Consultants from Partner agencies: cluster, technical partners from WHO, UNICEF, CDC, Rotary Consultants. (List of invited LGA's)

       Objectives of the Meeting:

• To Review the current  dashboard with the states
• To review the micro plans developed by the LGAs in order to improve quality
• Scaling up of demand creation innovations at the ward levels.
• To improve access in security prone areas and underserved populations
• Engendering Operational Gaps and Fixing Accountability

Methodology of the Meeting:

Plenary Session:

•  Presentation was made by the Incident Manager of the National EOC (Dr Andrew Etsano) on  the Objectives of meeting and the Journey so far. Please, find attached here

Group work:

A specific guideline (Please,find attached here) designed by the National EOC was presented by the Deputy Incident Manager (Dr Faisal Shuiab) to State and LGAs team members who sat in clusters to update work plans and strategize on innovative ways to improve quality of PEI activities bearing in mind the following considerations while reviewing the High Risk Operational Plans:

• Revision of HROPs with well-articulated statement of the challenges, agreed solutions, clear accountabilities, discrete and realistic time lines, accompanying budget
• Prioritizing the wards and settlements based on current and historical WPV epidemiology, IPDs quality, team performance issues, non-compliance etc
•  Deploy appropriate resources based on this prioritization
• Match plans with low season priorities.(please find attached)
• Develop and operationalize mechanisms for monitoring implementation of the HROP including use of dedicated Monitoring and Accountability officers to track progress

At the end of the two (2) day meeting specific operational plans was developed for each HR LGA and was presented to the National EOC.

Also, the following Prayers were made to the HMOH and the ED NPHCDA:

•  HMH and ED NPHCDA to advocate to the Governors, HCH to release counterpart funds for the programme (quarterly).
• The Governors/HCH to fund high impact demand creation activities such as health camps.
• Governors to call for monthly meeting of the LGAs chairmen to review the PEI performance and ascertain progress towards stopping WPV transmission

 Update on GPEI this Week (Data as 14^th Jan, 2014)

Nigeria:

• Two new WPV cases were reported this week - one from Damboa LGA, Borno State and one from Kura LGA, Kano State. 
• The total number of WPV cases for Nigeria 2013 is now 53 (all WPV1). The most recent WPV1 case in the country had onset of paralysis on 15 December from Damboa LGA, Borno State.
• One new cVDPV2 case was reported in the past week. The total number of cVDPV2 cases for 2013 is now 3. 
•    The most recent cVDPV case had onset of paralysis on 6 November (from Konduga LGA, Borno State).
•     SNIDs is scheduled to hold from 25^th – 28^th  January, 2014 in eleven (11) High Risk states

Globally:

•    In Syria, polio vaccination campaigns continue despite challenges. According to preliminary results more than 2 million children were immunized against polio across Syria last week during a third round of vaccination in response to a polio outbreak in the country. For more, please click here.
•         India celebrates three years since its last case of polio, despite once being considered the most challenging place to end the disease. Pending final clearance of December and January laboratory samples, the Regional Certification Commission is expected to certify the South-East Asia Region of the World Health Organization as polio-free in March. For more, please click here.
•     The WHO Executive Board (EB) will meet in Geneva on 20-25 January. Ahead of the EB session, the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) published the report: “Poliomyelitis: intensification of the global eradication initiative”. The full report is available in English and French here.

    Reported by: 

Suleiman Oshioke Yakubu
Technical Consultant  at CDC - Nigerian  Stop the Transmission of Polio (NSTOP)

 Mobile: +2348029584568

 Email:  iamsuleiman2003@yahoo.com

 Twitter: @iamsuleiman

 skype:  oshiokeyakubu

Blog:   oshiokeghb.blogspot.com

Linked-inkedin.com/pub/suleiman-oshioke-yakubu/15/24/81 

Related Links: 

1. Review of Polio Eradication Initiative in Nigeria - 2013 - http://oshiokeghb.blogspot.com/2014/01/review-of-polio-eradication-initiative.html
2. India Set to be declared Polio-free - http://oshiokeghb.blogspot.com/2014/01/india-set-to-be-declared-polio-free.html
3. How Nigeria Is Helping Stop Polio for Good - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-frieden-md-mph/how-nigeria-is-helping-st_b_4533042.html
4. Independent Monitoring Board of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative. Eighth report. London, England: Independent Monitoring Board; 2013. Available at http://www.polioeradication.org/aboutus/governance/independentmonitoringboard/reports.aspx
5. National Primary Healthcare Development Agency. Nigeria polio eradication emergency plan 2013. Abuja, Nigeria; 2013. Available athttp://www.polioeradication.org/Portals/0/Document/Aboutus/Governance/IMB/9IMBMeeting/4.2_9IMB.pdf .
6. National Primary Healthcare Development Agency. National Routine Immunization Strategic Plan 2013-2015
7. Recommendations of the 26th Expert Review Committee Meeting - 
8. CDC- Progress Toward Poliomyelitis Eradication — Nigeria, January 2012–September 2013, MMWR 2013 / 62(49);1009-1013
9. Bill Gates - What I Learned About Polio in Nigeria- http://www.impatientoptimists.org/Posts/2013/12/What-I-Learned-About-Polio-in-Nigeria
10. Poliomyelitis: intensification of the global eradication initiative - Report of the 66th WHA:  http://apps.who.int/gb/ebwha/pdf_files/WHA66/A66_18-en.pd