Uganda has declared a polio emergency, following confirmation of positive laboratory tests from environmental samples in the capital Kampala.
The country’s Health Ministry said in a statement on Tuesday that scientists have isolated a polio strain from two sewage treatment plants after results from the tests carried out at the Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI) confirmed a circulating Vaccine Derived Polio Virus type 2 (cVDPV2).
The ministry blamed the outbreak on the COVID-19 pandemic during which resources were diverted from polio vaccination projects.
The strain, it said, had a genetic linkage to the types reported in Sudan.
“The resurgence of polio in Uganda may be attributed to a halt in routine immunisation in the country during the COVID-19 pandemic,’’ the ministry said.
It also said that cross-border movements from neighbouring countries already affected by the polio strain “pose a risk of further polio importation into the country’’.
The Health Ministry had heightened surveillance, instigating a search for all polio cases in all health facilities and investigation of all children under the age of five years who suddenly got paralysis or weakness in the arms or legs.
The government will be conducting a house-to-house national polio immunisation campaign from October to December 2021, targeting children of five years and below, the ministry said.
Uganda and entire Africa were certified by the World Health Organization (WHO) as wild-polio virus free in August 2020.
Polio is a viral disease that is transmitted from person to person, mainly through a faecal-oral route or, less frequently, through contaminated water or food, and multiplies inside the intestines.
It usually affects young children under the age of five.
