Kabul, Jan 27 (IANS): Afghanistan initiated its first vaccination campaign in 2025, targetting over six million children under the age of five from poliovirus, the Ministry of Public Health reported.

Scheduled from Monday through Wednesday, the campaign will deliver anti-polio drops to children in 16 out of the country's 34 provinces, the state-run National Radio and Television quoted the ministry as reporting.

In his message, Noor Jalal Jalali, acting minister of public health, urged tribal elders, religious scholars and parents to support polio workers. Social support plays an essential role in preventing polio, he said.

Afghanistan and neighbouring Pakistan are countries where polio cases are reported every year, Xinhua news agency reported.

According to the World Health Organization, Poliomyelitis, commonly known as polio, is a highly contagious viral illness that predominantly impacts children under the age of five. The transmission of the virus occurs primarily through direct person-to-person contact, mainly via the faecal-oral route, although it can also spread through contaminated food or water. Once ingested, the virus multiplies in the intestines and has the potential to invade the nervous system, leading to paralysis.

In 1988, the World Health Assembly passed a resolution aimed at the global eradication of polio, which initiated the Global Polio Eradication Initiative. This initiative is led by national governments in collaboration with organisations such as the WHO, Rotary International, the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), UNICEF, and later supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.

Since the launch of this initiative, the incidence of wild poliovirus has plummeted by over 99 per cent, decreasing from an estimated 350,000 cases across more than 125 endemic nations in 1988 to just six reported cases in 2021. Among the three strains of wild poliovirus — type 1, type 2, and type 3 — wild poliovirus type 2 was declared eradicated in 1999, and type 3 was eradicated in 2020. As of 2022, wild poliovirus type 1 continues to circulate in two countries: Pakistan and Afghanistan.