World

To end polio, we must reach children still being missed

Most families who come to Mirwais Hospital in Afghanistan’s southern Kandahar province arrive because illness or injury has already struck. Abdul Rahman’s father made the difficult one-hour journey for a different reason: to protect his 4-year-old son from polio. We met him at the hospital’s vaccination corner in July, when we were visiting Afghanistan and Pakistan as part of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative’s Polio Oversight Board delegation. Within weeks of our visit, multiple children