The World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday reported at an Emergency Committee conference on the spread of polio that Afghanistan has actually recorded a 283% increase in polio cases in the nation this year.
According to a statement released by WHO, since the last Emergency Committee conference, in July this year, 51 new wild polio cases were reported &-- 17 from Afghanistan and 34 from Pakistan &-- bringing the total to 62 in 2024.
This represents a 283% increase in paralytic cases in Afghanistan and a 550% boost in Pakistan compared to all of 2023, WHO reported.WHO mentioned there has been an upward trend of wild polio detection in Pakistan because mid-2023, mainly from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Sindh and Balochistan provinces.
In Afghanistan, there has been an increase primarily in the south given that late last year 2023.
The emergency meeting to deal with the surge in polio cases was hung on November 6, 2024, and chaired by the WHO Director-General.
The statement however, was only released on Tuesday, December 3.
WHO kept in mind that both nations had carried out two nationwide vaccination project rounds in 2024.
Afghanistan has however implemented an additional 4 and Pakistan an extra six sub-national vaccination rounds.
&& After very encouraging development towards carrying out house-to-house campaigns in all of Afghanistan during the very first half of 2024, Afghanistan programme has just recently returned to implementing site-to-site modality projects.
&& The Committee was concerned about this recent development, since site-to-site campaigns are not able to reach all the children in Afghanistan particularly those of younger age and ladies, which might lead to a further rise of WPV1 (wild polio) with geographical spread in Afghanistan and beyond,& & the declaration checked out.
WHO stated that in addition to seasonal movement patterns within and in between the 2 endemic countries, the continued return of undocumented migrants from Pakistan to Afghanistan was intensifying the challenges.
&& The scale of the displacement increases the danger of cross-border poliovirus spread as well as spread out within both the nations.
&& This danger is being handled and reduced in both countries through vaccination at border crossing points and the upgrading of micro-plans in the districts of origin and return.
The program continues to closely coordinate with IOM and UNHCR,& & the declaration read.The company highlighted the need for more detailed vaccination efforts to avoid more spread of the illness and for the global neighborhood to step up efforts to assist the 2 countries get rid of the virus.The post WHO reports 283% boost in polio cases in Afghanistan this year first appeared on Ariana News.