KARACHI, June 2: Two new cases of polio have been detected -- one in Kohat and the other in Karachi in recent days, taking to 11 the number of children hit by the dreaded virus this year.

The national manager of the Expanded Programme on Immunisation, Dr H B Memon, told Dawn that the Kohat case had been confirmed by authorities in Islamabad on Monday.

Two cases of polio have been confirmed in the NWFP over the past two weeks. One of them, a 26-month-old girl, has no history of routine immunisation, but she had received at least 15 oral polio drops (OPV) so far, Dr Memon said. He said the NWFP had reported its first case this year.

About the other case, Dr Memon said that this case too had now been confirmed positive. The affected seven-month-old old boy has been living in Karachi’s SITE area, but received neither any routine immunisation dose nor the supplementary OPV doses at all.

He said a mopping-up activity was undertaken on May 22, using OPV type 3, while another sub-national immunisation campaign, along with other areas of Pakistan, would be launched on June 10.

Sindh EPI manager Dr Mazhar Khamesani said that he had been told by the field staff that the affected child belonged to a family which came to Karachi from Waziristan and was living in UC-9 in the SITE town.