Taliban will allow a national polio vaccination campaign in Afghanistan, says WHO

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An Afghan health worker administers a polio vaccine to a child in Kandahar province in 2019. Since 2018, the Taliban has blocked polio vaccination campaigns in parts of the country it controls. Now they’re reportedly changed their position.





Javed Tanveer/AFP via Getty Images



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Javed Tanveer/AFP via Getty Images



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«This is not only a win for Afghanistan but also a win for the region as it opens a real path to achieve wild poliovirus eradication,» said Dr. Ahmed Al-Mandhari, the WHO regional director overseeing Afghanistan, in a press release. «The urgency with which the Taliban leadership wants the polio campaign to proceed demonstrates a joint commitment to maintain the health system and restart essential immunizations to avert further outbreaks of preventable diseases.»

Aid organizations have battled misinformation and rampant conspiracy theories about Western vaccination campaigns seeking to sterilize Muslim children. Others claim vaccinators are spies, a lingering legacy of the CIA using a fake vaccination campaign to find Osama bin Laden in Pakistan in 2011.

And when the coronavirus pandemic hit in March 2020, the WHO ordered a pause of its campaigns to ensure that health workers weren’t inadvertently spreading COVID-19.

Experts had worried that the lack of widespread vaccinations could lead to an eruption of polio cases, which had been ticking up in 2019 and 2020.



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But only one case of wild polio has been reported so far in 2021, the WHO said, making this an «extraordinary opportunity» to eradicate the disease.

The Taliban has also agreed in principle to the need for vaccinations against measles and COVID-19, according to the WHO. The Taliban has also reportedly said it is committed to allowing women to participate as frontline workers — and guarantees the safety of health workers across the country.

The commitments appear to be part of the Taliban’s efforts toward building international legitimacy as a government. The U.S. and other countries have urged the Taliban to allow humanitarian agencies freer access to parts of the country in need of aid.