Pakistan Reports First Polio Case of 2026 in Sindh, Highlighting Eradication Hurdles

According to Pakistan's National Emergency Operations Centre for Polio Eradication (NEOC), the case was detected through the polio surveillance network and the Regional Reference Laboratory for Polio Eradication at the National Institute of Health (NIH), Islamabad confirmed it, Pakistan's leading daily Dawn reported.

Pakistan and Afghanistan are the only two countries in the world where Wild Poliovirus remains an endemic. Polio workers in Pakistan have been frequently targetted in attacks, particularly in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan.

Around a million children were not vaccinated and 53,000 refusals were reported during the first polio campaign conducted in Pakistan in 2026, local media reported. During the campaign, the largest share of refusals - 58 per cent - were reported in Pakistan's Karachi.

Polio drops were administered to over 44.3 million children in Pakistan. The data has indicated that the polio campaign achieved household coverage of 98 per cent, with only two per cent children missed, Dawn reported. However, the number of children who did not receive polio drops is still huge considering Pakistan's population.

Overall, 0.95 million children were reported as missed during the polio campaign launched in Pakistan in 2026. Among those, a large proportion of children (0.67 million) did not receive polio vaccination as they were not present at home. During the campaign, polio drops were administered to 2.5 million guest children, likely covering a substantial share of children who were not present at home at the time of vaccination.

"233,000 children were reported as leftovers due to security constraints, community boycotts, and snow-bound areas," said an official. He mentioned that the total leftovers included 184,000 from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and around 50,000 children remained unreachable in Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (PoJK) and Pakistan-occupied Gilgit Baltistan (PoGB) due to snow-bound regions and non-conduct of campaigns.

The official stated that the polio eradication campaign was postponed in Mastung, Gwadar, Chagai, and Awaran areas of Balochistan due to security reasons, Dawn reported. "0.14pc of the total targetted children were reported as refusals, with 31,000 refusals from Karachi, forming the largest share."

According to the statement, polio drops were administered to more than 22.9 million children in Punjab, over 10.5 million children in Sindh, more than 7.13 children in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and over 2.3 million children in Balochistan.

During the polio campaign, more than 455,000 children were vaccinated in Islamabad, approximately 261,000 children were vaccinated in PoGB and more than 673,000 children were vaccinated in PoJK.

- IANS