Polio Appears In Purwakarta, DKI Health Office Asks All Health Centers To Conduct Active Surveillance

Illustration of puskesmas officers weighing children's weight to measure the nutrition and body condition of toddlers. (Between)

JAKARTA - The DKI Health Office has asked all puskesmas to carry out surveillance or active investigation of the potential for polio in Jakarta. This followed the discovery of one polio case in Purwakarta and Pidie, Aceh.

Head of the Epidemiological Surveillance and Immunization Section of the DKI Jakarta Health Office, Ngabila Salama, said that his party had made an acute flaccid parakysis (AFP) alert letter or acute wither and polio paralyzed for health facilities in DKI.

"DKI Health Office urges puskesmas to carry out active community-based surveillance by conducting socialization to cross-sectors, especially community officials such as village heads, cadres, RT, RW, and community leaders," Ngabila said in his statement, Monday, March 20.

Then, the DKI Health Office also increased the target of finding AFP cases in 2023 to a minimum of 5 times the minimum target per city district per year.

So far, continued Ngabila, no polio cases have been found in Jakarta in recent times. "All suspected AFPs are followed up and laboratory examinations have been carried out. So far, all of them are negative," he said.

For information, the Ministry of Health confirmed the findings of three polio cases in children under the age of 5 in Pidie Regency, Aceh in November 2022.

This case re-emerged after Indonesia was declared polio free since 2014. At that time, the government immediately determined the findings of this case as an extraordinary incident (KLB).

Two cases of polio have re-emerged in North Aceh Regency and Bireuen Regency in January 2023. Then a toddler in Purwakarta was also declared positive for polio in the test results that came out on March 14, 2023, after previously showing a history of symptoms of growth and development disorders.