ISLAMABAD (Web Desk) - Health workers vaccinated over 44.7 million children during this year’s second nationwide anti-polio campaign, the National Emergency Operations Center (NEOC) said on Monday.
Pakistan kicked off its second anti-polio nationwide vaccination campaign from Apr 13-19, aiming to vaccinate over 45 million children. More than 400,000 polio workers took part in the seven-day door-to-door campaign.
Polio is a highly contagious viral disease that can cause permanent paralysis, mainly affecting children under five. Pakistan and neighboring Afghanistan are the only two countries where the disease remains endemic.
“The second nationwide polio campaign of 2026 has successfully concluded, with over 44.7 million children vaccinated,” the NEOC said in a statement.
More than 23 million children were vaccinated in Punjab province, over 10.4 million in Sindh, more than 7.1 million in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, over 2.6 million in Balochistan, around 441,000 in Islamabad, over 292,000 in Gilgit-Baltistan, and around 717,000 in Azad Jammu and Kashmir, it added.
Pakistan’s polio eradication program, which was launched in 1994, has faced repeated setbacks due to vaccine misinformation and resistance from some religious hard-liners.
Religious hard-liners claim immunization against the disease is a foreign plot to sterilize Muslim children or a cover for Western espionage.
Militant groups have also frequently targeted polio vaccination teams, prompting the government to assign security personnel to protect them, though it has not stopped deadly attacks, particularly in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and Balochistan.
A police officer was killed and four others were wounded last week when gunmen attacked a polio vaccination team in KP province on the first day of the campaign.