Health authorities say they are working to ensure that the recent polio outbreak is eradicated.

According to Programme Manager for Expatriate Programme on Immunisation in the Ministry of Health Dr Mike Chisema, government alongside health stakeholders have intensified surveillance across the country.

He said: “As a country we have been doing very well in terms surveillance and we have made sure that we should move around.”

“We continue to do surveillance both environmental and disease surveillance to see if there is a pocket of such kind of disease elsewhere because it’s possible people may not show signs and symptoms.”

Dr Chisema added that since the declaration of Public Health Emergency following the outbreak weeks ago, authorities are working on controlling the spread of virus which usually causes irreversible paralysis disease mainly in children aged between 0 and 15.

“Government will do its part but also the Global Polio Eradication Initiative are also going to support the most part,” Dr Chisema said.

“Because this is a global issue, we don’t polio in Malawi and globally so everyone has come to support the country in making sure that we contain the outbreak and we don’t find it anywhere.”

Malawi declared polio a public health emergency on February 17, 2022, following one confirmed case in Lilongwe involving a young girl, case s which authorities describe it as imported.