Polio makes a comeback in the Philippines 19 years after the country was declared free of the disease

The Philippines has reported its first case of polio since it was declared free of the childhood disease 19 years ago, dealing a blow to the campaign to eradicate it. The country's department of health said the disease was "re-emerging," with a case confirmed in a 3-year-old girl from Lanao del Sur, on the southern island of Mindanao, and a suspected case awaiting confirmation.
The World Health Organization said it was "very concerned" at the re-emergence of the disease in the country; UNICEF described it as "deeply disconcerting."
A global campaign to eradicate polio was launched in 1998 and cases due to the wild poliovirus have decreased by more than 99% since then, from an estimated 350,000 cases to 33 reported cases in 2018, according to WHO.
However, the disease is still present in Pakistan and Afghanistan and the emergence of new, vaccine-derived strains of polio have complicated efforts to rid the world of the disease.
The last known case of wild poliovirus in the Philippines was in 1993. The country was declared wild polio-free in 2000 along with the rest of WHO's Western Pacific Region.
The Philippines case was unexpected and the country was not on a list of at-risk countries.