KARACHI: A five-and-a-half-year-old child was confirmed to be the latest victim of the crippling poliovirus on Thursday in the city’s North Karachi area, officials said.

His is the ninth polio case in Karachi -- and 10th in Sindh -- this year.

Umair, a son of Mohammad Siddique, was among the four children from across the country whose samples had been sent to the National Institute of Health, Islamabad, for examination, which confirmed them after six weeks.

Officials in the city’s healthcare administration said Umair’s family lived in UC-5 of North Karachi.

“So far he is the oldest among the children inflicted with polio in Sindh. He was allowed to be administered polio drops just once a few years back,” said Dr Zafar Ijaz, executive district officer of health, Karachi, while speaking to Dawn. He said the victim was among the children whose families stubbornly stopped them from being vaccinated.

Also read: Polio cripples another Karachi child

He said his team would learn about the family’s ethnic background on Friday, when it would go for a follow-up round. He lamented that the family were rigid in their stance and very reluctantly allowed a surveillance officer to get the samples of the child to confirm whether he was inflicted with the disease or not.

Other children confirmed with polio included a girl from the North Waziristan Agency (NWA), from where a large population has got displaced after a military operation against the militants was launched. Another girl belonging to Peshawar fell victim to polio while a three-year-old girl from Chakwal became the first child from Punjab to be inflicted with polio.

All those cases, including Karachi’s Umair, were primarily caused by the non-administration of the polio vaccine either because of the family’s refusal or, in the NWA case, polio volunteers inability to reach them because of security impediments.

Barring a two-year-old child from a village of Sanghar district, the other nine polio cases have been reported from Karachi and seven of them belonged to the families of Pakhtun origin — the community that records most refusals for their suspicions over the vaccination.

Published in Dawn, August 8th, 2014