A police officer stands guard as a well being employee, proper, administers a polio vaccine to a toddler in a neighborhood of Peshawar, Pakistan, Monday, Oct. 28, 2024. Credit score: AP Photograph/Mohammad Sajjad
Pakistan detected another polio case within the restive northwest bordering Afghanistan, elevating the nation’s tally of the infectious illness to 50 circumstances this yr, officers stated Wednesday.
Pakistan and Afghanistan are the one two international locations on the earth the place the unfold of polio has by no means been stopped.
The sudden rise in circumstances of polio, which is an an infection attributable to a virus that principally impacts youngsters below 5, has hampered the nation’s yearslong efforts to make it a polio-free state.
The newest case was detected in Tank, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province the place militants typically goal polio employees and police assigned for anti-polio campaigns, in line with an announcement by the Nationwide Emergency Operations Centre for Polio Eradication. Pakistan has reported 50 such circumstances this yr, it stated.
Most polio circumstances this yr had been reported within the restive southwestern Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces bordering Afghanistan, the place 23 confirmed circumstances have surfaced, in line with knowledge from the World Well being Group. That is up from six circumstances in 2023.
Hamid Jafari, the WHO director for the Jap Mediterranean, stated final week the pressured repatriation of Afghans from Pakistan was a serious setback to polio eradication and has led to a “massive and unpredictable movement” of individuals inside the two international locations and throughout borders.
A police officer stands guard as a well being employee, middle, administers a polio vaccine to a toddler in a neighborhood of Peshawar, Pakistan, Monday, Oct. 28, 2024. Credit score: AP Photograph/Mohammad Sajjad
“The virus moved with these populations,” he informed a digital dialogue hosted by the International Polio Eradication Initiative.
He stated there have been different causes for the rise of polio in Pakistan, together with the influence of militancy in some elements of the nation.
Pakistan often launches campaigns in opposition to polio regardless of assaults on the employees and police assigned to the inoculation drives. Militants in Pakistan typically goal police and well being employees throughout campaigns in opposition to polio, claiming the vaccination drives are a Western conspiracy to sterilize youngsters.
Greater than 200 polio employees and police assigned for his or her safety have been killed for the reason that Nineties, in line with well being officers and authorities.
Earlier this month, a bomb hooked up to a bike exploded close to a car carrying law enforcement officials assigned to guard polio employees in Balochistan, killing 9 folks together with 5 youngsters.
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Pakistan experiences new polio case in northwest, elevating nationwide tally to 50 circumstances this yr (2024, November 20)
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