Pakistan reports its first polio case this year. Many NATO countries will also miss their defense budget target in 2023

The first known case of polio occurred this year in Pakistan. The country’s health authorities reported this on Friday.

The virus has caused paralysis in a two-and-a-half-year-old toddler in the southwestern province of Baluchistan, according to the head of Pakistan’s state anti-polio program. This is the first confirmed infection there in more than two years.

Polio is a contagious infectious disease that can cause permanent paralysis and death, especially in small children. The virus is often spread through contaminated water. There is currently no cure. The disease has been eradicated through vaccination campaigns in most countries around the world. Pakistan is one of the few countries where diseases caused by the wild variant of the pathogen still occur regularly. According to official information, six cases were discovered last year, mainly in the northwest of the country, near the Afghan border.

The measures against the spread of the virus in Pakistan are overshadowed by violence. There have been repeated attacks on vaccination teams in the country, some of which have been fatal. Polio vaccinations are seen by some Islamist militants as a Western tool to sterilize Muslims. (rbu/sda/dpa)