Pakistani authorities today launched an anti-polio drive aimed at covering over 700,000 children in the tribal areas and frontier regions of the country's northwest.
The three-day campaign will cover all the semi-autonomous tribal regions except North and South Waziristan Agencies, Bara sub-district, some areas of Orakzai Agency and three union councils of Frontier Region Bannu.
As a result, some 0.2897 million children will miss the crucial drops.
Arbab Muhammad Arif, Additional Chief Secretary of the tribal areas, administered polio drops to children at the FATA Secretariat to formally inaugurate the campaign in the restive region.
According to official data, a total of 712,985 children will be inoculated during the campaign by 2,638 teams of health workers.
The Federally Administered Tribal Areas have recorded 17 polio cases in recent months. Of them, 16 are from North Waziristan Agency where the Taliban banned polio vaccinations in July 2012. One case was reported from Khyber Agency.
Pakistan is one of only three countries where polio remains endemic.
