ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Wednesday expressed concern over the emergence of new polio cases in the country while presiding over a meeting to review the affairs of the National Health Ministry at the PM House in Islamabad.
Pakistan is one of the last two countries in the world, along with Afghanistan, where polio remains endemic. The country has made significant efforts to eradicate the disease, including organized nationwide polio vaccination campaigns. However, challenges such as parental refusal, misinformation and security issues have hindered full eradication.
Pakistan reported its fifth polio case this week after a two-year-old child from Quetta, Balochistan, passed away, saying he was suffering from the disease.
“We will utilize all national resources and partner help to ensure the complete eradication of polio from the country,” the prime minister was quoted as saying in a statement circulated after the meeting.
Pakistan has been working closely with various international donors and agencies, including the World Health Organization, United Nations Children’s Fund and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, to eradicate polio.
These collaborations focus on funding, providing vaccines and supporting public health campaigns to increase vaccination coverage and monitor polio cases across the country, especially in high-risk areas.
The prime minister also announced the construction of the Quaid-e-Azam Health Tower in Islamabad, saying it would meet international standards and directed the immediate preparation of a plan to build the facility under public-private partnership.
He instructed that the health tower should include top-quality hospitals, a medical university, a nursing university, modern technology-equipped laboratories and diagnostic centers for diseases.
“The health sector is an extremely important and sensitive sector, tasked with the crucial duty of saving human lives,” he said. “I will personally oversee health-related matters in Islamabad.”

KARACHI: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s newly elected administration is set to present its first federal budget today, Wednesday, which is expected to play a pivotal role in Pakistan’s negotiations with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to secure yet another loan from the lending agency.
Last year, Pakistan received $3 billion from the IMF under a Stand-By Arrangement (SBA) to stabilize its economy in the short term, including addressing immediate financial needs like debt repayments and supporting economic reforms.
However, given ongoing economic challenges like low foreign reserves and substantial fiscal deficits, Pakistan continues to need external financial support to meet its long-term goals and sustain structural reforms.
While Pakistan has actively pursued economic diplomacy to strengthen trade and investment relations with other countries, Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb explicitly said on Tuesday there were no alternatives to the IMF under current circumstances.
“As you all know, I have been in this role for about three to three and a half months,” he told a news conference in Islamabad. “But even when I was in the private sector, I was very loud and clear that we should go into the IMF program because there is no plan B. If there were a plan B, the IMF would not be called the lender of last resort. There’s a reason for that.”
Aurangzeb applauded the prime minister for successfully completing the nine-month IMF loan program despite difficult circumstances.
“If, God forbid, that hadn’t happened, today we wouldn’t be sitting here discussing our [economic] targets,” he said. “We would have been as a country in a very different situation. We would be having the same discussion but in a very different context so that was the starting point.”
The minister also addressed the IMF’s insistence on ending tax exemptions for a fresh loan.
“There are no sacred cows,” he told the media. “Everyone has to contribute to this economy. Because in this country, philanthropy can run schools, universities and hospitals, but it cannot run the country. The country can only be run with taxes. And this is a basic principle.”
Aurangzeb is expected to present the budget in the National Assembly later in the day.