Fewer than 20 cases reported during the same period last year. PHOTO: FILE
PESHAWAR:
The National Institute of Health (NIH) in Islamabad confirmed on Tuesday the country’s 83rd polio case of the current year.
According to the institute, five-month-old Hazrat Ali, son of Sher Nawab, is the latest victim of the crippling disease. He hails from Kaza Mada Khel village of Datta Khel in Miramshah, North Waziristan. Ali had not received a single dose of the polio vaccine.
This takes the total number of cases in the year to a staggering 83, of which 65 have been reported from the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata). In Khyber-Paktunkhwa, 12 cases have been reported while six have surfaced from Sindh. During the same period last year there were fewer than 20 reported cases.
The wild type-1 polio case is the 54th from North Waziristan Agency where the Taliban have imposed a ban on vaccination.
A health official said all children diagnosed with the virus had not received a single dose of the oral polio vaccine as a result.
Published in The Express Tribune, June 18th, 2014.
COMMENTS (7)
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@Yasir R But i care for my Pakistani brothers & regularly visits this site to know that in which conditions are they living, Despite poverty, Bomb blasts, Target killings, Polio are they ok? And the last to know what they have gained by creating a separate Nation for Muslims. We Indian Muslims feels sorry for them. You dont care but we do.
I am in Malaysia for a visit. Every possible crime is here but the media is silent do everything looks ok. In Pakistan there is nothing but the media, under some influence, is shouting, so it seems everything is there. I request my media to he realistic, nothing else.
Indians making the polio an excuse to criticize our military just shows their own inhumanity and insecurities. You can talk till you are blue in the face. Our army is here to stay. Pak fauj zindabad.
All the IDPs from North Waziristan/FATA coming into refugee camps must get vaccinated with polio drops or refused into refugee camps. Desperate situations call for desperate measures.
I always wonder, How come there are Indians commenting on Pakistan related news on a Pakistani newspaper website? on all Pakistani news websites actually.I never visited Indian websites because i just simply.....dont care?
Continuing prevalence of Polio in Pakistan is the inevitable outcome of Pakistan’s obsession for boxing above her weight class and nurturing an outsize military in order to seek parity with India leaving little resources to causes such as eradicating Polio.
Till such time as Pakistan accepts the immutable reality that she is inferior to India, Pakistan’s civilians will continue to suffer from the scourge of diseases like Polio. Also Pakistan’s civilians will suffer the consequences of the stunted development of other social sectors such as education.
The solution is thus rather straight forward. Pakistan needs to accept that she is India’s inferior. The big question that then remains is will Pakistan make the rational choice and junk the braggadocio of attempting to seek equality with India? Or will it accept the inevitable consequence of stunted development entailing Pakistan’s civilians figuratively “Eating Grass”?.
The failure of Pakistan to vaccinate children against polio owing to the Pakistan Military’s gorging of scarce national resources for military prestige building, weapon system acquisition, building a large nuclear weapon stockpile and supporting lavish life styles for the Punjabi dominated military top brass, has the potential of adversely effecting India through spread of the disease across the border into India. So in order to prevent the polio virus joining the list of other unwelcome exports from Pakistan into India; namely terrorists, firearms, ammunition, explosives, illegal narcotics and counterfeit Indian currency notes, it would be prudent for India to just stop providing visa’s to Pakistanis to visit India and simultaneously prohibit Indian’s from visiting Pakistan.
India should not permit herself to be swayed by sympathy inducing Pakistani arguments about the need for maintaining people to people contact, helping divided families and using visit visas as confidence building measure to foster peace. India must instead be free to enjoy the fruits of eschewing the temptation of acquiring lots of nuclear “bums” and weapon systems in order to make resources available for polio eradication unlike Pakistan.