ISLAMABAD, Dec 1: The emergence of four new cases of polio (type-I wild virus) has showed that the federal government's campaign has failed to achieve the desired results despite the fact that a polio eradication emergency year has been declared in the country, Dawn has learnt.

The number of nationwide polio cases has now reached 165 after the four new reports came from Bahawalpur, Qila Abdullah, Balochistan, and Khyber and Bajaur agencies in Fata. According to a senior federal government official, the affected children had been given routine dosages of polio vaccine.

“This is the second case after a span of over two years in Bahawalpur, where the first one was reported in June 2009. Now it has affected a baby girl, Hafza Bibi, 4,” said the official. “Waleed Rehman, 21-month, from Khyber Agency and Naseerullah, 4, of Bajaur were also given dosages of polio vaccine but the crippling virus attacked them,” he added.

Pakistan now risks becoming the last remaining reservoir of the endemic polio virus in the world, and the only remaining threat to achieving global polio eradication. The virus is continuing to cripple children in Pakistan because of the failure to reach all children with sufficient dosages of vaccine.

The official said the federal government's polio campaign was on degeneration and the emergence of new polio cases was evidence of its poor performance.

In a report, Dr Altaf Bosan, the national coordinator for the prime minister's monitoring and coordination cell for polio, recommended: “There is a need for radical steps by the provincial, district health and administrative leadership to plug the gaps in the campaign quality with special focus on high-risk tehsil, UCs and hard-to-reach areas,” added the official.

Officials in the national polio emergency campaign, including Dr Bosan, refused to give any statement to this reporter. However, a health expert added: “The government has to rethink its policy about the anti-polio drive which is being looked after by the bureaucracy, including the cabinet division.”