The number of polio cases detected in Pakistan is set to hit a record high this year as Islamist militants continue to attack health workers.
Health officials in Pakistan said 187 cases of polio have been detected so far this year, and it is likely the yearly total will surpass the previous high of 199 cases in 2000.
In recent years militants have disrupted prevention efforts by attacking polio vaccination teams.
Some 59 people, including health workers and police providing security for the teams, have been killed in militant attacks on polio vaccination teams since December 2012.
Pakistan is one of only three countries in the world where polio remains endemic.
Insurgents claim that polio vaccinations are a Western conspiracy to sterilise Muslims.
“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,” Rana Muhammad Safdar, a senior official at the Pakistan National Institute of Health told AFP.
A senior official of the World Health Organisation (WHO) in Islamabad confirmed the new number of polio cases, adding the figure was likely to cross 200 by year-end.
Mr Safdar, who also heads the federal Expanded Program on Immunisation, said 130 of the cases reported were from the troubled north-western tribal areas that border Afghanistan and are home to Taliban and Al Qaeda militants.
The WHO official said the Pakistani strain of the virus had spread to neighbouring Afghan provinces. Afghanistan has recorded a total of seven cases this year.
Polio cases reached a low of 28 in 2005 but rose to 198 in 2011.
In 2012, Pakistan had 58 cases while 72 were recorded in 2013.
Officials have said tens of thousands of children were missing a polio eradication campaign every year “because of the law and order situation,” in tribal areas as well as family and parents unwilling or afraid to vaccinate.
As Pakistan moves into its post-monsoon period, officials fear the final figure could rise as high as 250.
Militant opposition to vaccination has increased after Pakistani doctor Shakil Afridi attempted to help the CIA track down Al Qaeda terror chief Osama bin Laden through a fake vaccine project.
ABC/AFP