Pakistan’s polio fight hit by new case and deadly attack

By Staff Reporter

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan confirmed its seventh polio case of 2025 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on Wednesday, while two security personnel were killed in an attack on a polio vaccination team in Balochistan, highlighting the persistent challenges of disease eradication amid security threats.

The Regional Reference Laboratory for Polio Eradication at the National Institute of Health confirmed the poliovirus case from Torghar district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. This marks the second case from the province this year and the seventh across Pakistan.

A nationwide polio vaccination campaign, the second of 2025, is underway from April 21 to 27, targeting 45.4 million children under five, with another planned for May 26 to June 1.

The campaign, the second of three planned for early 2025, involves 415,000 workers administering oral vaccine drops to children under five. It ranks among Pakistan’s largest public health efforts, reflecting its push to eliminate polio.

Polio, a paralyzing disease with no cure, requires multiple vaccine doses for immunity. Pakistan and Afghanistan are the last countries where it remains endemic.

Cases fell from 20,000 annually in the early 1990s to one in 2021, but the recent surge—74 in 2024 and seven this year—underscores challenges in the eradication program started in 1994.

Vaccine misinformation and resistance from some religious hard-liners, who claim immunization is a foreign conspiracy to sterilize Muslim children or a guise for Western espionage, have hindered efforts. Militant groups have also repeatedly targeted polio workers, posing a significant threat to the campaign.

In Balochistan’s Mastung district, unidentified gunmen attacked a polio vaccination team in the Kali Teri area, killing Levies personnel Nake Muhammad and Maqsood Ahmed, local authorities said. Security forces sealed off the area, arrested two suspects, and launched a search for a third who escaped injured, they added.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif condemned the attack, vowing that such incidents would not derail Pakistan’s polio eradication efforts, according to a statement from his office.