ISLAMABAD, Pakistan: The Foreign Office said on Thursday that Pakistan is committed with its responsibility regarding polio eradication from the country and every Pakistani travelling abroad is being administered with vaccination.
In her weekly media briefing in Islamabad on Thursday, the Foreign Office spokesperson Tasneem Aslam said that the government is taking every possible step in this regard.
However, she added, that it is regretful that new polio cases have been recorded.
Pakistan set to record highest number of polio cases: officials
Earlier, a senior official at the Pakistan National Institute of Health Rana Muhammad Safdar said that the country is set to break its record for the highest number of polio cases in a year.
“The number of polio cases, recorded this year has reached 187 and if it reaches 200, we will cross our own record of 199 in year 2000,” Safdar told a foreign news agency.
The number of polio cases in Pakistan during the current year has reached 187 after three more cases have been reported from Bara tehsil of the Khyber tribal region while according a senior official of the World Health Organisation (WHO) in Islamabad, the figure is likely to cross 200 by year-end.
Pakistan is one of only three countries in the world where polio remains endemic; the other two are Afghanistan and Nigeria.
In May, the WHO imposed strict travel restrictions on Pakistan due to increasing cases of polio in the country, making it mandatory for Pakistani citizens to carry a polio vaccination certificate during foreign travel.
