Pakistan reports second polio case of 2025

A health worker marks a child’s finger after administering polio drops during a vaccination drive in Neelum Valley on February 4, 2025.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Pakistan has confirmed the second case of poliovirus as the nation struggled to eliminate the crippling disease, authorities said.

The case was reported on Wednesday (February 12, 2025).

The Regional Reference Laboratory for Polio Eradication at the National Institute of Health in Islamabad confirmed that the new infection of wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) was reported in the Badin district of Sindh.

The first case of the year was reported earlier from Dera Ismail Khan district in South Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KP).

In 2024, Pakistan reported 74 confirmed cases of polio, with 27 from Balochistan, 22 from KP, 23 from Sindh, and one each from Punjab and Islamabad.

The new infection comes at the heels of the first nationwide polio campaign of 2025, conducted from February 3 to 9, which authorities claimed successfully achieved 99 per cent of its target, vaccinating more than 45 million children.

Pakistan and Afghanistan are the only countries where polio is still rampant.

One of the reasons for the failure to eradicate the virus is opposition by the Islamists who consider the anti-polio vaccine a conspiracy to sterilise Muslims.