Kaduna — Kaduna State government is hunting, discovering and administering polio vaccine on children in the state, who skipped the last routine exercise in southern Kaduna, in an effort to eradicate the crippling virus.

As the battle for the total eradication of Polio in Kaduna State becomes more serious, state government officials have launched and intensified manhunt for children who missed the last immunization.

Weekly Trust gathered that the incidence of two missing children in Zangon-Kataf community recently compelled the Kaduna state deputy governor, Ambassador Nuhu Audu Bajoga to lead the search into some huts in southern Kaduna to find the children and have them immunized.

Acting on this mindset, a team of concerned top government officials, comprising the deputy governor, who doubles as chairman, State Task Force on Polio Eradication and Strengthening Routine Immunization, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Health, his counterpart in the Deputy Governor's office, Chairman of Zangon-Kataf Council among others and accompanied by polio officials, braved a cloudy weather to invade some targeted huts. These huts were located in Ungwan Aya and Madauchi in the local government area and the mission was simply to search and rescue the two children who missed being immunised

The targeted hamlets domiciled a little over 200 kilometres from Kaduna city, became public cynosure by the sheer number of top government officials' who thronged the peaceful rural farming communities just for the sake of polio immunization and eradication.

Bajoga explained that the main reason for the visit to the communities was to determine whether the two children in the community who 'missed out' during the earlier immunization had been recovered and rightly immunized.

He said this move became necessary to forestall any re-emergence of the dreaded polio virus in not only the local government area, but its subsequent spread to other parts of the state.

Likening the mission to the Biblical analogy of dumping 99 sheep in search for one missing sheep, Bajoga left his comfort zone to trek long distances, through bushy farmlands and muddy footpaths to identify these two children for the sake of polio eradication.

The state government mission was fruitful, as the two missing children were not only found, but had polio vaccine administered on them. Thereafter, the entourage proceeded to the palace of the leader of the community, the Agwam Bajju, Malam Nuhu Bature in Zonkwa, where they briefed him on their mission to his domain.

Bajoga told the traditional ruler that "we are here today because there was a case of two missing children during the last routine polio vaccination. As the committee saddled with the responsibility of ensuring total eradication of polio in the state, we have decided to come back to ensure that these two children are located and properly vaccinated alongside others."

Bajoga said the state government was looking for the children because it is only in Nigeria, Pakistan and Afghanistan in the whole world that the white-polio virus is still available, adding that government has spent so much money on polio eradication and "so, we must always go round to insist that the routine polio exercise is complete."

The Agwam Bajju, Malam Nuhu Bature expressed his chiefdom's readiness to partner with the state government to rid the entire state of polio. He said he was particularly happy that the deputy governor took it upon himself to personally do on-the-spot assessment to determine the success of the programme.

"I want to sincerely thank the state government for engaging in this inspection to free our communities and the state of the polio virus. I want to assure the government of our chiefdom's support to rid the state of polio," Bature said.

Earlier at Madauchi, during an interaction with members of the community, the deputy governor emphasized the need for the people to be patient and respond positively to government's call to key into the polio programme for a total eradication of the virus. He appealed to the people not to nurse any negative disposition towards the programme or assume that government was disturbing them.

At a Fulani family compound at Ungwan Aya, Bajoga trekked long distance to supervise the administering of the polio vaccine on Fulani children in the community and to assess their response to the programme. He was impressed with the total response of the Fulani to the routine immunization in the local government area, but was quick to insist that parents must submit to their immunization for posterity.

Chairman of Zangon-Kataf Local Government, Christopher Haruna testified that efforts to totally eradicate the dreaded polio disease in all nooks and crannies of the local government and the state were yielding positive results. He pledged the council's readiness to continually lend support to government on polio issues by organizing the people to regularly avail their children for vaccination.