Despite ongoing conflict, humanitarian crises, and funding pressures, WHO’s polio programme in the Eastern Mediterranean Region made significant strides in 2025, advancing multiple fronts toward eradication. In Afghanistan and Pakistan, efforts to interrupt wild poliovirus transmission intensified, guided by Technical Advisory Groups and strengthened national and regional oversight. Both countries focused on critical transmission zones, expanded community engagement, and improved cross-border coordination. In Afghanistan’s East Region, strategic resets included more health facilities offering vaccinations, revised microplans reducing distances between households and vaccination sites, and enhanced community mobilization. Pakistan targeted high-risk areas such as southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Quetta bloc, and Karachi, implementing operational adjustments, strengthened accountability, and synchronized campaigns with Afghanistan. These efforts resulted in fewer than half the number of cases reported in 2025 compared to 2024, offering a strong epidemiological opportunity to interrupt transmission.
Regional support played a vital role in sustaining these gains. Member States rallied to assist countries affected by wild and vaccine-derived polioviruses amid humanitarian crises, with high-level engagement from donors and partners. In February 2025, Saudi Arabia committed US$500 million to vaccinate 370 million children over five years, while the UAE supported outbreak responses in the Gaza Strip. Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE also backed the Polio Legacy Challenge in Afghanistan to strengthen health infrastructure alongside eradication efforts.
Reaching children in complex humanitarian contexts remained a priority. In the Gaza Strip, improved access and ceasefire arrangements enabled vaccination campaigns to reach over 602,000 children, potentially interrupting cVDPV2 transmission. Sudan conducted campaigns covering more than 91% of targeted children in Darfur, while Yemen and Egypt implemented intensified efforts to control outbreaks, including border vaccination clinics to prevent virus importation.
Political momentum in the Horn of Africa and Yemen was reinforced through the first virtual quarterly Interministerial Meeting on Variant Poliovirus in October 2025, involving Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, and Yemen. Countries committed to coordinated vaccination campaigns, joint surveillance, and enhanced cross-border information sharing. National taskforces, such as Somalia’s, were established to protect children from polio and other vaccine-preventable diseases.
Laboratory capacity across the region was strengthened to improve poliovirus detection. Oman inaugurated a modular poliovirus laboratory in Muscat to test wastewater samples from across the region, complementing its National Polio Laboratory. Tunisia’s Regional Reference Polio Laboratory was also upgraded to test wastewater for poliovirus, advancing both regional and global health security.
Integration with routine immunization enhanced efforts to protect children from polio and other vaccine-preventable diseases. Aligning the polio programme with the Essential Programme on Immunization supported disease surveillance, preparedness, diagnosis, and response, while reinforcing health systems in high-risk areas. This integration is crucial to controlling outbreaks and building resilient health systems in regions with low routine immunization coverage.
Finally, gender equity was prioritized under the leadership of WHO Eastern Mediterranean Regional Director Dr Hanan Balkhy, who assumed the role of Global Polio Eradication Initiative Gender Champion. She highlighted the vital contributions of women in vaccination campaigns and laboratories and advocated for gender perspectives to be integrated at all levels of the programme, ensuring equitable access and community trust remain central to eradication efforts.
In 2025, these seven advances—from targeted strategies and regional solidarity to humanitarian access, political engagement, laboratory strengthening, integration with routine immunization, and gender equity—demonstrated the Eastern Mediterranean Region’s unwavering commitment to achieving a polio-free future.
