By NewsDesk  @infectiousdiseasenews

Officials with the Zamboanga City Health Office say that a one-day polio vaccination campaign is scheduled for October 23 at the health center of Barangay Sta. Maria.

Image/CDC-/ Meredith Boyter Newlove, M.S., James Archer, M.S.

Dr. Dulce Amor Dagalea-Miravite, city health officer, said Saturday the targets of the immunization campaign are children below five years old and “those who missed their dose of polio vaccines.”

Miravite said polio is preventable through vaccination. Three doses of Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV) and Inactivated Polio Vaccine (IPV) vaccines are needed by each child to be protected against polio.

On 19 September 2019, an outbreak of polio was declared in the Philippines. Two human polio cases (VPDV2) were reported in the Philippines last month in a three-year-old girl from Lanao del Sur and a five-year-old boy from Laguna.

The last known case of wild poliovirus recorded in the Philippines was in 1993. The country was declared wild polio-free in 2000.