Sindh reports over 35,000 vaccine refusals amid anti-polio drive: sources

KARACHI: Around 35,000 parents in Sindh have declined to have their children vaccinated against the poliovirus, with most refusals coming from Karachi, sources have said. 

The Pakistan Polio Eradication Programme, working alongside the Expanded Program on Immunisation (EPI), had conducted a vaccination campaign in 25 districts across the province from September 1 to 7.

The latest campaign had initially targeted 2.1 million children, but a significant number of children in Sindh, particularly Karachi, remained unvaccinated, the sources said.

The insiders added that out of the total 35,000 refusals in the province, around 34,000 were reported from Karachi as parents declined to administer the vaccine to their children.

They said that highest number of refusals was reported from Karachi’s East district.

“Over 8,000 parents declined to administer drops of polio vaccine to their children in District East,” the sources revealed.

The revelation came just a day after Sindh recorded its seventh polio case of 2025, with a child in the Hyderabad district confirmed to have the poliovirus.

According to the Regional Reference Laboratory for Polio Eradication at Islamabad’s National Institute of Health (NIH), the latest case involved an eight-month-old girl from Hyderabad.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) tops the list with 18 polio cases, followed by Sindh’s seven cases. Punjab and Gilgit-Baltistan have reported one case each this year so far.

Meanwhile, another nationwide polio vaccination campaign is set to begin on October 13 and run through October 19.

The drive — with participation from over 400,000 workers — is aimed at vaccinating around 45.4 million children across the country for protection against polio.

The upcoming vaccination campaign will follow the National Emergency Operations Centre (NEOC) for Polio Eradication’s Sub-National Polio Vaccination Campaign, which took place earlier this month.

The vaccination drive was conducted across 88 districts of the country, including Hyderabad, reaching approximately 21 million children under the age of five.

Polio is a highly infectious and incurable disease that can cause lifelong paralysis.

The only effective protection is through repeated doses of the Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV) for every child under the age of five during each campaign, along with the timely completion of all routine immunisations.