QUETTA: Polio virus detected in a 30-month-old boy of Quetta does not match with samples from local sewage system but those of Karachi, provincial coordinator at the Emergency Operation Centre told journalists on Thursday.

Genetic sequencing had shown that this year’s first polio case of Balochistan, detected a couple of days ago in Mohammad Ikram, son of Jumma Khan, matched with the virus found in Gadap area of Karachi and not a local virus, Dr Saifur Rehman said.

Moreover, the virus found in environmental samples from the site of Hadi Picket in Qila Abdullah was from Helmand province of Afghanistan and not from Chaman, he added.

Most probably, the virus travelled from Helmand to the border town of Chaman, he said.

Dr Rehman added that someone definitely brought the virus from Karachi and infected Ikram with it.

He was of the view that children in Balochistan were vulnerable to the disease because the province was located between two high-risk areas —Karachi and Kandahar.

Published in Dawn, February 26th, 2016