Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Sunday launched this year’s second nationwide anti-polio campaign, running from April 21 to April 27, and vowed to achieve ‘roaring success’ in the effort.

Pakistan is one of the last two countries in the world, alongside Afghanistan, where polio remains endemic. Despite global efforts to eradicate the virus, challenges such as security issues, vaccine hesitancy, and misinformation have slowed progress.

Last year, the country reported more than 70 polio cases, with the virus detected in around 90 districts. This year’s first nationwide polio vaccination campaign was held in Feb, followed by a fractional IPV-OPV Polio (injectable polio vaccine) campaign in Quetta and Karachi on Feb 20 and 22, respectively. Around 1 million children were targeted for vaccination in this campaign, according to the officials.

Speaking at the ceremony in Islamabad today, PM Shehbaz said: “Through our collective efforts, we will be successful in this campaign. I would like to thank our international partners, like the World Health Organisation and the Bill Gates Foundation.

“We are grateful for your support, and I want to assure you that we will achieve a roaring success,” in this effort.

According to the government, 45.4 million children will be administered the polio vaccine, and a total of 415,000 polio workers would participate in this nationwide campaign.

“Throughout Pakistan, tens of millions of children will be given polio drops. This will include Gilgit Baltistan and Azad Jammu and Kashmir, and all of us pray that the Ministry of Health, their teams and provincial teams will be successful in eradicating polio from Pakistan.”

“I request parents throughout the country to help us and the teams in the field to make this campaign a success,” the premier added.

He also added that elaborate security arrangements have been made for the areas with security issues.

Polio is a paralysing disease that has no cure. Multiple doses of the oral polio vaccine and completion of the routine vaccination schedule for all children under the age of five are essential to provide children with high immunity against this terrible disease.

The government is hopeful that efforts to eradicate the polio­virus are bearing fruit as no new case of the crippling disease has been reported in more than two months with the last case of 2025 being reported on February 10.