Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif met Bill Gates, Chair of the Gates Foundation, in New York on September 23 on the sidelines of the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly, with Pakistan's ongoing effort to eradicate polio at the centre of their discussions.
According to the Prime Minister's Office, PM Shehbaz reiterated his government's commitment to completely eliminating polio from the country and thanked the Gates Foundation for its longstanding support. Gates acknowledged Pakistan's progress, describing eradication as essential to protecting future generations from the disease, and praised the prime minister's guidance to provincial governments on the nationwide vaccination programme.
The meeting also covered a broader range of cooperation, including maternal and child health, nutrition, immunization, digitization, financial inclusion, and agriculture. PM Shehbaz invited Gates to visit Pakistan again.
Where Pakistan Stands on Polio in 2026
Pakistan has confirmed four polio cases in 2026, according to the National Emergency Operations Centre for Polio Eradication (NEOC). The figure is below the totals recorded in recent years, with the country reporting 31 cases in 2025 and 74 in 2024.
Since Pakistan launched its Polio Eradication Initiative in 1994, the country has reduced reported polio cases by approximately 99.8 percent, from an estimated 20,000 cases annually in the early 1990s to 31 cases in 2025. The NEOC reported in July 2026 that the positivity rate of environmental surveillance samples had fallen to 13.1 percent during the first six months of the year, with Punjab recording zero positive samples among all 31 samples collected in June.
| Year | Confirmed Polio Cases |
|---|---|
| 2019 | 147 |
| 2021 | 1 |
| 2024 | 74 |
| 2025 | 31 |
| 2026 (as of September 11) | 4 |
Bannu Division: The Remaining Bottleneck
Three of the four cases confirmed in 2026 are from Bannu Division in southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The fourth was detected in Sujawal district in Sindh in early March.
The NEOC confirmed that the most recent case, an eight-month-old child from Miryan tehsil in Bannu district, came from an area where vaccination teams had not been able to reach children consistently since 2025 due to security constraints. Two earlier cases in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were reported in Bannu and North Waziristan districts in late April, both involving children in areas with documented access difficulties.
The pattern reflects a challenge that has persisted in southern KP: while overall virus transmission has declined across most of the country, security-related access limitations in specific districts have allowed the virus to continue circulating in communities where children are missing critical vaccine doses. The NEOC has said it is implementing alternate strategies in the region, including integrated health service delivery and community-based vaccination initiatives aimed at improving coverage.
Pakistan and Afghanistan remain the only two countries in the world where wild poliovirus is considered endemic.
A Partnership Broader Than Polio
The September 23 meeting in New York followed a visit by a Gates Foundation team to Pakistan earlier this month, which PM Shehbaz referenced during his conversation with Gates.
According to the PMO statement, the prime minister expressed interest in expanding collaboration beyond public health to include agriculture, digital innovation, and artificial intelligence. He briefed Gates on his government's agricultural reform agenda, with a focus on biotechnology, climate resilience, research, and building capacity for farmers.
The two sides agreed to explore potential cooperation in the development of improved seeds, livestock genetics, and emerging agricultural technologies, according to the PMO. These represent areas of interest rather than confirmed programmes at this stage.
PM Shehbaz also highlighted the Gates Foundation's role as a partner in digitization and financial inclusion in Pakistan, areas where the foundation has been involved alongside other development efforts in recent years.
