ISLAMABAD: Polio cases continue to emerge unabated, with the country reporting another wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) case, raising last year’s total to 72.

The Regional Reference Laboratory for Polio Era­dication at the National Institute of Health confi­rmed the detection of the latest case from Dera Ismail Khan district in Khyber Pakh­tunkhwa, marking the 11th case from the area.

“The latest victim is a female child from Dera Ismail Khan. The sample was collected on December 31 so the case has been placed in the list of year 2024,” an official at the laboratory said.

“Of these 72 cases, 27 are from Balochistan, 22 from KP, 21 from Sindh, and one each from Punjab and Islamabad,” he said.

Published in Dawn, January 16th, 2025