ISLAMABAD, March 21: President Asif Ali Zardari admitted on Wednesday that the government’s polio eradication campaign had suffered a setback in Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata).

“There are some challenges in reaching out to the children in Fata where the initiative received a setback as a result of security situation in some of the areas,” he said during a meeting at the Presidency with Dr Robert S. Scott, Chair of Rotary’s International Polio Plus Committee.

According to President’s spokesman Farhatullah Babar, Mr Zardari said Governor of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the health authorities in Fata were working closely with armed forces to provide security and access to polio teams.

He said children in tribal areas were being taken care of through Special Polio Points at agency and district borders.

The president was quoted as saying: “I wrote letters to all governors and chief ministers recently urging them to personally oversee the polio eradication campaign and programme in order to ensure its effective implementation.”

However, there are media reports that polio cases are still being detected in different parts of the country exposing government’s failure to eradicate the disease.

According to KP’s deputy director of Expanded Programme on Immunisation, Dr Janbaz Afridi, four new cases of polio were detected in different districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa during the current year.

The cases were found in Peshawar, Lakki Marwat, Dera Ismail Khan and Kohat districts.