13-month-old girl diagnosed with poliovirus in KP's Tank district

PESHAWAR: Despite multiple vaccination campaigns, poliovirus continues to cripple children as one more case has been reported in Khyber Pakhytunkhwa, the Health Department confirmed on Wednesday.

The crippling disease was detected in a 13-month-old girl — from whom samples were taken in December 2024 — in the Tatta area of KP's Tank district, pushing the total number of cases in 2024 from the district to five and overall provincial tally to 21.

KP remains the second most affected by the poliovirus and is only superseded by Balochistan which reported 27 cases out of the total 69 cases from last year.

Meanwhile, Sindh reported 19 cases whereas one case each was reported in Punjab and Islamabad.

Owing to the confirmation of the latest case in the KP, the Health Department has said that the first anti-polio drive of the ongoing year will be launched in the province from February 13.

The inoculation campaign will aim to vaccinate over six million children.

Pakistan is one of the two polio-endemic countries in the world, along with Afghanistan, and the number of cases on a yearly basis had significantly dropped in the country, until the recent spike in cases.

Pakistan Polio Eradication Programme explains that polio is a "paralysing" disease with "no cure" and "the completion of the routine vaccination for all children under the age of five" just provides them "high immunity against this terrible disease".

The government has launched multiple vaccination drives as part of its efforts to wipe the disease out of the country with the last one being in December 2024 aiming to innoculate 44,000,000 children across the country.

A provincial week-long anti-polio campaign was also launched in Balochistan on December 30 with the goal to vaccinate more than 2.6 million children up to five years of age.