WHO extends travel restrictions for Pakistan due to ongoing polio risk

The determination was reached during a meeting of the World Health Organization's Emergency Committee for the 2005 International Health Regulations, an entity responsible for monitoring the worldwide propagation of the poliovirus.

Expressing reservations about Pakistan's counter-polio initiatives and their efficacy in reaching a substantial number of children, the committee spotlighted the difficulties faced by both Pakistan and Afghanistan in their joint endeavors to eliminate polio.

Recent positive environmental assessments in Peshawar and Karachi have underscored the continuous vulnerability to a polio epidemic within Pakistan, according to the committee's observations. Moreover, the committee reported the detection of a new case of Wild Poliovirus Type 1 (WP1) in Pakistan during 2023, taking the year's total to 2 cases. Both incidents were recorded in the Bannu district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province.

Notwithstanding the vaccination of an additional 160,000 children in southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as part of an action plan, the committee emphasized the enduring obstacles in the region. These encompass political instability, security concerns mandating police presence for frontline workers, and instances of vaccination refusal.

In Afghanistan, the emergency committee disclosed the emergence of five new WPV1 cases in Nangarhar province since the previous meeting. It also cautioned against any setbacks in Afghanistan's polio eradication endeavors, noting the risk posed to Pakistan due to significant population movement between the two countries.

The committee sounded an alarm about the persistent threat of WPV1 resurgence in the southern region. This is attributed to ongoing transmission in eastern Afghanistan, the trans-border spread into Pakistan, and a sizable population of unvaccinated children in the southern reaches of Afghanistan.

Following WHO's International Travel and Health guidelines, all travelers are advised to receive the complete polio vaccine. Residents and visitors staying over four weeks in affected areas are recommended to obtain an additional dose of either oral polio vaccine (OPV) or inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) within four weeks to twelve months following travel. (ILKHA)