Two more polio cases surface in KP
- By Web Desk -
- May 23, 2019
ISLAMABAD: Two more polio cases have been reported from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, taking the total number for the current year to 19 in Pakistan.
According to details, the new cases have been reported from Dera Ismail Khan and Bannu.
An official of Polio Virology Laboratory at the National Institute of Health (NIH), said that a nine-year-old girl was found to be infected with the poliovirus in D.I. Khan.
He said another case of a 17-month- old girl was surfaced from Bannu.
Recently, on Monday, 17-month-old girl in North Waziristan was confirmed to contract have polio virus.
Five months into the 2019 and the number of polio cases reported from KP has reached 13 which is equal to the cases reported in the province in 2016.
The number of total polio cases this year has climbed to 19 — 13 from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, three from Punjab and three from Sindh.
The vaccination campaign to eradicate polio from Pakistna has seen major setbacks in recent weeks.
Misinformation and anti-vaccine narrative remains one of key challenges in Pakistan’s fight against the crippling disease.
Pakistan is one of the three remaining countries in the world where poliomyelitis (polio) is still categorised as an endemic viral infection.
The others being Afghanistan and Nigeria.