ECNEC approves revised emergency plan for polio eradication

ISLAMABAD: The Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) on Friday approved revised emergency plan for eradication of polio at a cost of 986.29 million US dollars.

The ECNEC, which met in Islamabad with Finance Minister Asad Umar in the chair, also approved  feasibility study and dualisation of 42-kilometer long Mardan-Swabi Road at a cost of 9550.10 million rupees.

The polio eradication plan aims to end the disease through supplemental immunization, across the country and use of environmental surveillance to completely check polio virus transmission.

A fresh polio case was detected on January 10 in the Lakki Marwat area of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP).

Babar Bin Atta, the focal person to prime minister on polio, confirmed that a 16 months old baby girl was infected with the polio virus. He told journalists that the symptoms of the disease appeared in the patients in December last year.

Babar Bin Atta said that the infant’s blood sample was sent to the National Institute of Health (NIH) Islamabad for confirmation of the virus. Later, the NIH confirmed detection of poliovirus in the blood sample, he added

He said that total nine polio cases were reported in different areas of the country in 2018.

Minister for Planning, Development and Reform Makhdoom Khusro Bakhtiar, on January 4, had said that polio would be eradicated from Pakistan by 2019.

https://arynews.tv/en/polio-case-detected-in-lakki-marwat/