Two more wild polio cases have been confirmed from North Waziristan, leaving young boy and a girl paralyzed, health officials confirmed on Friday.
According to them, both children are 18-months old and belong to Mir Ali. The female child had onset of paralysis on May 10 and the male child on 11 May 11.
Both cases were confirmed by the Pakistan National Polio Laboratory at the National Institute of Health, Islamabad on Thursday, May 26. This is the sixth case in North Waziristan, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, this year.
“These children will struggle for the rest of their lives because of the pain of disabilities caused by polio. I urge the people of Pakistan to vaccinate your children,” said Federal Health Minister Abdul Qadir Patel.
The southern districts of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa that include North and South Waziristan, D.I.Khan, Bannu, Tank and Lakki Marwat, are at highest risk of wild polio virus. While no human transmission has been reported outside North Waziristan, two positive environmental samples between April and May were reported from Bannu.
“All children suffering from wild polio are being offered rehabilitation services but regardless of the support the government provides, there is cure to polio. The only way to protect children is to give them repeated doses of the polio vaccine,” said Federal Health Secretary Aamir Ashraf Khawaja.
