Fresh polio case detected in Afghanistan: official

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan –A fresh positive polio case, affecting a 14-month boy, had been detected in Afghanistan's southern province of Kandahar, bringing the number of confirmed cases of polio virus to 11 since January this year, a public health official said Tuesday. 

"The case was detected in the Police District 9, Loya Wiyali area of the provincial capital Kandahar city recently," Abdul Qayum Pakhla, the provincial public health director, told Xinhua. 

According to Pakhla, Loya Wiyali is located several kms north of the provincial capital city, where the residents use open toilets and have no access to clean drinking water. 

Polio virus could be rapidly transferred and the only preventable way was vaccination, the official added. 
In early August, Afghan Public Health Ministry, with the support of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), launched a nationwide five-day campaign to give immunity vaccination dose to 9.9 million children under the age of five. 

The ongoing insurgency and conflicts have been hindering the efforts to stamp out the infectious disease in the mountainous country as 1.2 million children from areas inaccessible to vaccination teams missed the latest vaccination drive.Enditem 
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