ISLAMABAD: Pakistan reported its 12th polio case of the year on Thursday in the country’s northwest tribal area, a former stronghold of the local Taliban that borders Afghanistan.
Polio is a highly infectious disease caused by poliovirus mainly affecting children under the age of five years. It invades the nervous system and can cause paralysis or even death. However, children can be protected from its lifelong impact via vaccination.
Most people residing in conservative Pakistan’s tribal areas consider the polio vaccination a Western campaign aimed at sterilizing the country’s population. In 2012, the local Taliban ordered a ban on immunization against polio in Pakistan’s western tribal areas. Dozens of polio workers have been killed in Pakistan in the line of duty.
In April, the South Asian country detected the first case of the debilitating disease after a gap of 15 months. In less than three months, Pakistan has reported 11 more polio cases.
“A 21-month-old boy has been paralyzed by wild polio in the 12th case in Pakistan this year. All children belong to North Waziristan,” Pakistan’s health ministry said.
The child had an onset of paralysis on June 18 and belongs to Mir Ali, a town in North Waziristan district in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, confirmed the Pakistan National Polio Laboratory.
The health ministry said the southern districts of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, which include North and South Waziristan, Dera Ismail Khan, Bannu, Tank and Lakki Marwat, are at the highest risk of wild poliovirus transmission.
“Bannu also reported two positive environmental samples between April and May this year, confirming that ongoing wild poliovirus transmission is not limited to North Waziristan,” the statement read.
“Even though these cases are happening in the same part of the country, parents and caregivers around Pakistan must remain extremely vigilant and give their children repeated doses of the polio vaccine,” Federal Health Secretary Dr. Fakhre Alam Irfan said in a statement.
This year, 13 polio cases have been reported from Pakistan and Afghanistan, the only two countries in the world where polio remains endemic.
