Polio this week - GPEI
Polio this week

Headlines 

GPEI Action Plan published

The Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) published its Action Plan – a comprehensive roadmap to streamline operations and sustain momentum toward a polio-free world in light of ongoing global reductions in development assistance.  The Action Plan, developed through extensive consultation and grounded in the latest data, sets out how GPEI will focus activities where they will have the greatest impact, making deliberate, sometimes challenging choices to minimize risk, safeguard hard-won gains, and maintain progress toward a polio-free world.  More.

TIME magazine includes hexavalent vaccines as part of its ‘Best Inventions of 2025’ list

Earlier this year, Senegal and Mauritania became the first two low-income countries to distribute lifesaving hexavalent vaccines. The six-in-one vaccine combines two vaccines currently supplied to low-income countries: a pentavalent vaccine that targets diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, hepatitis B, and meningitis, as well as a separate polio vaccine. Because the hexavalent vaccine simplifies dosing schedules—it involves three injections rather than five spread across two vaccines—more young children will gain protection against polio in particular, according to Gavi, the global health organization that covered the majority of the vaccine’s costs in the two countries. Hexavalent vaccines have been in use in Europe and the U.S. for 25 and 13 years, respectively. It wasn’t fair that “lower-income countries have had to wait,” says Katy Clark, Gavi senior programme manager.

From polio survivor to vaccinator in Pakistan

Meet Masood Khan, and his inspiring story, of having polio himself to protecting others from this lifelong disease as a polio vaccinator, in Peshawar.

Rotary End Polio Now ambassador Anne W Strike raises awareness of polio and empower survivors through sport

Read the inspiring story of Anne Wafula Strike, Rotary End Polio Now ambassador, Paralympian and author, who is raising awareness, tackling stigma and empowering survivors through sport, in her native Kenya.

Against the odds:  Madagascar’s fragile polio story

An extensive, visually-driven story in Devex on Madagascar’s successful polio outbreak response.

Summary of new polioviruses this week: 

    • Afghanistan:  one WPV1 case
    • Pakistan:  32 WPV1-positive environmental samples
    • Algeria:  one cVDPV2-positive environmental sample
    • Angola:  one cVDPV2 case
    • Lao PDR:  one cVDPV1 case
    • Nigeria:  two cVDPV2 cases and two cVDPV2-positive environmental samples
Country updates as of 16 October 2025

More information on the countries that have reported cases and/or environmental samples this week.

  • One WPV1 case was reported this week, from Uruzgan, with onset of paralysis on 19 September. The number of cases in 2025 is seven. The number of cases for 2024 remains 25.
  • No WPV1-positive environmental samples were reported this week.

  • No WPV1 cases were reported this week.  The total number of cases this year is 29.  The number of cases for 2024 remains 74.
  • 32 WPV1-positive environmental samples were reported this week, from across the country, collected in September.

  • No cVDPV1 case was reported this week.  
  • No cVDPV1-positive environmental sample was reported this week.
  • No cVDPV2 case was reported this week.
  • One cVDPV2-positive environmental sample was reported this week, from Tamanghasset, collected on 25 August.

  • One cVDPV2 case was reported this week, from Cuando Cubango, with onset of paralysis on 16 August. There have been 12 cases reported in 2025. The number of cases for 2024 remains nine.
  • No cVDPV2-positive environmental samples were reported this week.

  • One cVDPV1 case was reported this week, with onset of paralysis on 3 September, from Savannahket.  It is the first case in the country this year and is a new emergence. 

  • Two cVDPV2 cases were reported this week, from Borno and Sokoto, with onsets of paralysis on 6 July and 1 August.  The total number of cases reported this year is 37. The number of cases from 2024 remains 98.
  • Two cVDPV2-positive environmental samples were reported this week, from Sokoto and Lagos, collected on 15 July and 14 August.