Afghanistan Polio Communication Update

This bi-monthly e-newsletter from the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) outlines innovations and strategic shifts in communication to support polio eradication in Afghanistan. The focus is on the 13 high-risk districts in the southern region that are especially vulnerable because of lack of access due to insecurity.

For example, the stories in the first newsletter, published in August 2010, record the responses to the Type 1 wild polio virus (WPV) outbreak in Tajikistan, which necessitated a "mop-up" (a focused vaccination campaign that backs up routine immunisation and National Immunisation Days (NIDs), with a focus on high-risk areas or places where surveillance detects a rogue virus) in the north and north-eastern regions of the country. Other articles focus on: a communication planning workshop and social mapping training for communication focal points conducted in the southern region; the Kandahar mop-up; the findings of a knowledge, attitudes, and practice (KAP) study that confirms radio and television as chief sources of information in security-compromised areas (the findings of which will reportedly guide UNICEF in tailoring communication messages and strategies in the south); and efforts to find partners in the southern region.