The Pakistani Prime Minister announced on Saturday that he would chair an emergency meeting of the national commission in charge of the eradication of polio after the detection of the first case for 15 months of this neurodegenerative disease.
To discover
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Health authorities announced the discovery of a new case on Friday stating that "
a 15-month-old boy was paralyzed in North Waziristan
", a district near the Afghan border.
"
Deeply saddened to report that a 15-month-old boy has been paralyzed in North Waziristan
," tweeted physician Shahzad Baig, National Emergency Operations Center Coordinator for Pakistan's Polio Eradication Program.
“
Pakistan confirms wild #poliovirus case after nearly 15 months
,” he added.
The number of cases has fallen sharply
Pakistan had celebrated on January 27 the fact of having passed a year without the slightest new case of poliomyelitis, which had never happened before in its history.
Health authorities have assured that they are working to prevent the spread of the virus in the country.
The Prime Minister's office announced that Shehbaz Sharif will chair an emergency meeting of the national polio eradication commission on Monday.
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Since Nigeria officially eradicated the virus in 2020, Pakistan is one of only two countries in the world, along with Afghanistan, where polio remains endemic.
But the number of cases has fallen sharply in the country.
To completely eradicate the disease, three years must pass without any cases being recorded.
This new case brings the global polio toll in 2022 to three patients, after a case in Malawi, discovered in November 2021 but confirmed in February, and another in Afghanistan, according to data from the Global Polio Eradication Initiative. Poliomyelitis (IMEP).
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