DHAKA: A polio outbreak has been confirmed among young children in north-east Syria and risks spreading in the region.

The World Health Organisation warned on Tuesday, reports The Straits Times.

Twenty-two children in Deir al-Zor province became paralysed this month with acute flaccid paralysis, symptoms that can be caused by other diseases, and WHO’s laboratory in Tunis has now isolated the wild polio virus in samples taken from 10 victims.

‘Out of those 22 being investigated, 10 are now confirmed to be polio type one,’ WHO spokesman Oliver Rosenbauer told a news briefing in Geneva.

Most victims are under two years old and are believed never to have been vaccinated against the crippling disease or to have received even a single dose of the oral vaccine instead of three which ensure protection, he said.

BDST: 1716 HRS, OCT 29, 2013
RoR/RK