Pakistan polio campaign starts Monday: 24 million children in 97 districts get drops until November 8, with the full province list

Polio teams start knocking on doors across Pakistan on Monday. The week-long campaign runs from November 2 to November 8 in 97 districts and aims to give vaccine drops to about 24 million children under the age of five.

Federal Health Minister Syed Mustafa Kamal opened the drive on Friday at the National Emergency Operations Centre for polio eradication in Islamabad, giving the first drops himself. More than 200,000 frontline workers will take part. It is the fifth large polio drive of 2026 and the third that covers selected districts rather than the entire country.

Is your district on the list? The numbers by province

This is not a nationwide round, so not every family will get a visit. The National Emergency Operations Centre has set these targets:

Province or region	Districts	Children to reach
Punjab	13	9.278 million
Sindh	20	6.883 million
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa	27	4.808 million
Balochistan	31	2.217 million
Islamabad	Capital territory	447,000
Azad Jammu and Kashmir	2	183,000
Gilgit-Baltistan	3	153,000
Total	97	About 23.97 million

Officials have rounded the target to 24 million in public statements; the centre's earlier announcement said more than 23.9 million.

The spread tells its own story. Punjab has just 13 districts in the campaign but the largest number of children, because its targeted districts are heavily populated. Balochistan has 31 districts and far fewer children, and teams there must cover long distances.

What parents need to do this week

The drops are given at home, so the main job for families is to make sure a child is not missed.

• Who gets the drops: every child under five, including babies and children who received drops in an earlier round.
• What is given: two drops of oral polio vaccine by mouth.
• Where: vaccination teams go house to house in the listed districts between November 2 and 8.
• If a team does not come: tell your local health office, or call the national Sehat Tahaffuz helpline on 1166.

Repeat doses matter. Polio has no cure and can leave a child paralysed for life, and health workers say each extra round builds a child's protection further. A child who was vaccinated in September should still take the drops this week.

Seven cases this year, down from 31

Pakistan has confirmed seven wild poliovirus type 1 cases so far in 2026: five in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and two in Sindh. All of last year produced 31. Officials say cases have fallen 99.8 percent from an estimated 20,000 a year in the 1990s, when the national programme began.

The hardest ground remains the south of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Kamal said transmission in that area needs targeted action, and that the federal government is working with provinces and district administrations on security and access problems.

Those problems are real for the people doing the work. In September, unidentified gunmen killed two police constables who were guarding a polio team in Balochistan, a police official said. No group claimed the attack.

Why Afghanistan is running the same campaign

Pakistan and Afghanistan are the last two countries where wild polio is still endemic, and the virus does not stop at the border. Families move between the two countries for work, trade and medical care. The November round therefore runs at the same time on both sides, so that children on the move are less likely to be missed.

Security along that frontier is tense. Pakistan and the Afghan Taliban traded sharp statements this week over militant attacks, and there has been firing in border districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which is also where the campaign has 27 districts to cover.

Teams will finish on Sunday, November 8. The polio programme has not yet announced the date of the next round.