19.7 million children vaccinated against polio nationwide

ISLAMABAD: A week-long anti-polio campaign conducted from September 1 to 7 successfully vaccinated 19.7 million children under the age of five across multiple districts in Pakistan, according to the National Emergency Operations Centre (NEOC).

The campaign reached over 4 million children in Punjab, 8.7 million in Sindh, 2.2 million in Balochistan, and 4 million in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (K-P). In Islamabad, nearly 479,000 children received the polio vaccine, while 112,000 children were vaccinated in Gilgit-Baltistan and 164,000 in Azad Jammu and Kashmir.

The initiative followed the detection of wild poliovirus in sewage samples from Hyderabad through environmental surveillance.