A police officer stands guard as a health worker (right) administers a polio vaccine to a child in a neighborhood of Peshawar, Pakistan. File
| Photo Credit: AP

Pakistan began a nationwide vaccination campaign on Monday (October 28, 2024) to protect 45 million children from polio after a surge in new cases that has hampered years of efforts to stop the disease in one of the two countries where it has never been eradicated.

Pakistan regularly launches such campaigns, but violence targeting the health workers and police assigned to escort them is common. Militants falsely claim the vaccination campaigns are a Western conspiracy to sterilise children.

Pakistan reports two new polio cases; tally rises to 39 this year

The campaign is the third this year and will continue until Sunday “in response to the alarming increase in polio cases,” said Ayesha Raza Farooq, the Prime Minister’s advisor for the polio eradication programme. “We are re-energised in our efforts to combat polio,” she said in a statement.

During the door-to-door campaign, children younger than five will be vaccinated and given drops of Vitamin A supplements to enhance their immunity. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif recently met with front-line health workers, urging them to ensure no child was left unvaccinated by going door-to-door.

Anwarul Haq, who is the coordinator of the National Emergency Operations Centre for Polio Eradication, also urged parents to fully cooperate with polio workers. “Polio has no cure, but it can be prevented with this readily available vaccine,” he said.

Four new polio cases reported in Pakistan, tally rises to 37 this year

“Pakistan has recorded 41 cases across 71 districts so far this year,” Ms. Farooq said. Most were reported from southwestern Balochistan and southern Sindh province, following by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province and eastern Punjab province.

The surge in cases in new locations is worrying authorities since previous cases were from the restive northwest bordering Afghanistan, where the Taliban government in September suddenly stopped a door-to-door vaccination campaign.

Authorities in Pakistan say the Afghan Taliban’s recent decision to stop door-to-door anti-polio campaign will have repercussions beyond the Afghan border, as people from both sides frequently travel to each other’s country. The World Health Organisation has confirmed 18 polio cases in Afghanistan this year.

Pakistan and Afghanistan are the only two countries in the world where the spread of polio has never been stopped. It is one of the world’s most infectious diseases, so it continues to spread anywhere people are not fully vaccinated. In severe cases, polio can cause permanent paralysis and death.

A health worker administers a polio vaccine to a child at a neighbourhood of Peshawar, Pakistan. File
| Photo Credit: AP

“Pakistan has reported 39 polio cases this year, with two fresh cases of the crippling disease being detected in the Sindh province,” authorities said on Sunday (October 20, 2024.)

“The latest cases were confirmed on Saturday (October 19, 2024) in the Sanghar and Mirpurkhas districts of the province,” the Dawn newspaper reported.

Pakistan confirms 5th polio case of year 17 days after victim’s death

These come after four cases were reported a day earlier, jolting the country’s efforts to eradicate the poliovirus. According to the Regi­o­nal Reference Laboratory for Polio Eradication in Islamabad, the newest victims are a girl and a boy.

“These are the first polio cases from Mirpur­khas and Sanghar this year,” the report quoted an official as saying. “The prevalence of the virus had already been confirmed in the two neighbouring districts following multiple environmental samples testing positive for WPV1 since April,” the official added.

In ten months of the year, Pakistan has reported 39 cases of poliovirus, of which 20 were reported from Bal­o­c­h­istan, 12 from Sindh, five from Khyber Pakhtun­khwa and one each from Punjab and Islamabad.

Prime Minister’s Focal Person for Polio Eradication Ayesha Raza Farooq acknowledged the spread of the virus across the country but noted that a strategy has been developed to eradicate the crippling disease by June 2025.

“The Pakistan Polio Programme has planned a new nationwide vaccination campaign from October 28 to immunise more than 45 million children under the age of five,” the report said.

“Pakistan and Afghanistan are the only countries in the world where polio remains endemic,” according to the World Health Organization.