Pakistan kicked off an anti-polio vaccination campaign on Monday to vaccinate 9.5 million children across several districts in the country amid a surge in cases of the disease, state-run media reported.
The development takes place after Pakistan reported three people contracted the disease last week. Two of the cases were reported in Pakistan’s southwestern Killa Abdullah district while one child contracted the disease in the southern port city of Karachi. Polio has been eliminated in developed nations but persists in parts of India, Nigeria, Afghanistan and Pakistan. It is a highly infectious disease that invades the nervous system and can cause total paralysis. While polio mainly affects children under five years of age, anyone who is unvaccinated can contract the disease at any age.
“Anti-polio campaign of varied duration will start in forty-one districts of the country from tomorrow,” the state-run Associated Press of Pakistan (APP) reported on Sunday. “During the special campaign, more than 9.5 million children under five years of age will be administered polio vaccine.” It said the campaign would be held in 16 districts of Balochistan, 11 districts of Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), eight districts of Sindh and five districts of Punjab province.
