ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has reported a fresh polio case in its northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province, the National Emergency Operations Center (NEOC) for Polio Eradication said on Sunday, bringing this year’s nationwide tally to eight cases.

Polio is a paralyzing disease that has no cure. Multiple doses of the oral polio vaccine and completion of the routine vaccination schedule for all children under the age of 5 is essential to provide children high immunity against the disease.

In the latest case, the NEOC confirmed poliovirus in a 13-month-old girl in Bara tehsil of KP’s Khyber district. This is the second case reported from Khyber and the sixth from the northwestern province so far this year.

“The case is a reminder of the importance of vaccinating every child,” the NEOC said, urging parents to ensure that all children under five receive the oral polio vaccine in the upcoming polio campaign on Nov. 2-8.

Pakistan’s polio campaigns have long been hampered by misinformation and vaccine refusals, as well as attacks by militant groups, who falsely claim polio vaccines are part of a Western plot to sterilize Muslim children or cause infertility.

In Sept., unidentified gunmen killed two police constables deployed to protect a polio vaccination team in Balochistan, a police official said. No group claimed responsibility for the attack.

According to government data, Pakistan has reduced polio cases by 99.8 percent from an estimated 20,000 cases in the early 1990s to 31 last year.

The latest campaign will be the fifth large drive of 2026 – the third subnational – and will mobilize over 200,000 frontline polio workers.

“It will be implemented simultaneously in Pakistan and Afghanistan – the last two endemic countries in the world for wild poliovirus – and supported by strong cross-border coordination,” the NEOC said this week.