Al Jazeera speaks to Dr Hamid Jafari, WHO’s regional director of polio eradication, on the current situation and the prospects of Pakistan eradicating polio.

Dr Hamid Jafari, WHO's regional director of polio eradication was cited by Al-Jazeera as saying that the challenge exists in southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan.

“Pakistan and Afghanistan have never been this close to reaching the goal of eradicating wild poliovirus (WPV1) concurrently,” said Dr. Hamid Jafari, the World Health Organization’s director ...

Jafari also mentioned other factors contributing to the rise of polio in Pakistan, including authorities' inability to consistently carry out vaccination campaigns in areas affected by militancy ...

Hamid Jafari, the WHO director for the Eastern Mediterranean, said last week the forced repatriation of Afghans from Pakistan was a major setback to polio eradication and has led to a “massive ...

WHO’s polio director in the Eastern Mediterranean warned the new law could backfire. “Coercion is counterproductive,” Dr Hamid Jafari said.

Former Pakistan Test cricketer Farooq Hamid died at the age of 80. Hamid, who played one Test for Pakistan at the MCG in 1964, had been suffering from cancer, according to his family.

Jafari says that this major shift in vaccination strategy was a crucial move that helped Afghanistan and Pakistan to edge even closer to eradication, along with rapid responses to outbreaks.

NPR's Juana Summers talks with Dr. Hamid Jafari, director of Polio Eradication for the WHO's Eastern Mediterranean region, about the effort to administer some 600,000 vaccines in Gaza.

Hamid Jafari, director of polio eradication for the WHO Eastern Mediterranean Region, told the event that until 2020, about 13 families of wild poliovirus had spread across the neighboring countries.

"Pakistan and Afghanistan continue to operate in a highly complex and challenging environment," Dr Hamid Jafari, director of polio eradication at the WHO Eastern Mediterranean Region, told DW.