KARACHI: The city on Friday reported its first polio case in 20 months, setting alarm bells ringing for the megapolis still not clear of the crippling virus, officials said.

They said that a seven-month-old baby of an Afghan refugee family living in Union Council-13 of Gulshan-i-Iqbal had contracted polio. They added that the National Institute of Health, Islamabad, confirmed the samples sent from here three weeks ago tested positive for polio.

It is also the first case reported from Sindh since October last year and fourth in the country with one each reported from Punjab, Balochistan and Gilgit-Baltistan.

The parents had constantly refused to have the baby administered polio vaccination drops during several campaigns in the past, the officials said.

“It is the first case in the city since January 2016. It is extremely unfortunate,” said a senior official in the emergency operation centre (EOC) for polio in Sindh.

Officials said the family of the child, Qasim, a son of Mohammad Ghani, hailed from Tora Bora and was displaced during the US-led army operation in Afghanistan.

They settled in Karachi’s Sher Khan village in Madina Colony, locally known as the Tora Bora village.

“It is heartbreaking that this child has contracted polio,” Fayaz Jatoi, coordinator of the EOC, said. “His family used to refuse polio vaccine and we were only able to vaccinate this child on one occasion.”

Had the child been vaccinated on multiple occasions, he would not have had to suffer the scourge of polio, he said.

However, Karachi, which was known as the largest reservoir of polio in the world, has made tangible progress in eradicating polio. As many as 23 cases were registered from the city three years ago.

Published in Dawn, September 2nd, 2017