67 Kids Hospitalized in Bengal after Pulse Polio goof

Sixty-seven children were hospitalized in Arambag, about 80km from Kolkata, after they were mistakenly given hepatitis B vaccine instead of Pulse Polio drops on Sunday. Four health workers have been suspended for the lapse and chief minister Mamata Banerjee has ordered an inquiry.  Pulse Polio drops are given orally while the hepatitis B vaccine is administered through an injection. On Sunday, more than 100 children were given the latter vaccine orally.  Sunday being Pulse Polio Day, health workers had set up booths at two schools in Goghat. One Ganga Ruidas, who had gone to Khatun primary school with his 14-month-old son, noticed that the health workers were taking out the vaccine from vials of hepatitis vaccine. By then, 114 children had been fed drops of the vaccine. Police were informed and angry parents locked up the district officials till policemen reached the school.

Panic spread soon with parents complaining that their children were vomiting and sweating profusely. Of the 67 children admitted to Arambagh sub-divisional hospital, 18 were discharged later and the rest have been kept under observation. Doctors said the children were doing fine. A number of doctors TOI contacted in Kolkata said the hepatitis B vaccine would not cause any harm. But they were concerned the incident would hurt parents' faith in the medical system and have an effect on the Pulse Polio campaign. Director of health services Biswaranjan Satpati said the four health workers had been suspended for negligence. "They should have been more cautious while administering the polio drops," he said. "While this is extremely undesirable, we must be careful that a repeat of this incident must not happen. I can guarantee that oral administration of hepatitis B vaccine will not cause any harm in the children."

Senior paediatrician Dr Apurba Ghosh, who's also the director of the Institute of Child Health, said: "Giving hepatitis B vaccine orally will not cause any health problem in the children. But the fear is that people will lose faith in the medical system and the immunisation programme. We need to be extremely cautious while giving any kind of medicine to children." Paediatrician Dr Chandan Banerjee, vice-president of the Indian Medical Association's Kolkata branch, expressed outrage at the lapse. "How can hepatitis B vaccine be mistaken for polio drops?" he said. "Though it will not cause any major harm to the children, this will only create misunderstanding and misconception about the immunisation programme."  India would have been declared polio-free as early as 2011 had it not been a case reported from Howrah's Panchla in January that year. If no other case is reported, the country will receive a polio-eradication certificate from the World Health Organisation in about five months.

Had the mistake not been pointed out on Sunday, it would have been taken for granted that the children of that area had been covered under the immunization programme. This would have been harmful for the entire campaign.  "This would have given a major blow to polio-eradication effort," said Dr Ghosh. "Thankfully, it was pointed out that the children were given hepatitis vaccine and not polio drops. The Unicef, which is working hard for polio eradication, is taking stock of the situation."