Health Ministry confirms third polio case in Pakistan

ISLAMABAD: Third polio case of the year 2023 was confirmed in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s (KP) Bannu district on Wednesday as Pakistan struggling to get rid of the crippling disease, ARY News reported citing sources at the Ministry of National Health.

The third confirmed case of polio in 2023 was discovered on Wednesday in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Bannu province, according to sources at the Ministry of National Health who were quoted by ARY News. Pakistan is fighting to eradicate the devastating illness.

Health ministry sources reported that the polio virus discovered in a youngster from the Bannu region of KP has been confirmed by the National Polio Laboratory. "Polio virus has been confirmed in an 18-month-old girl at UC Ghora in Bakakhel," the sources continued.

There were as many as 20 cases of poliovirus recorded nationwide in 2022. When there was only one case reported in Pakistan in 2021, the disease was almost completely eradicated.

Anwaarul Haq Kakar, the interim prime minister, began a five-day anti-polio campaign on Monday.

New data reveals that September 2023 was the world's warmest September on record by a "extraordinary" margin. Scientists attribute this to factors other than just climate change.

New data has revealed that last month was not only the hottest September on record, but it was hotter by a margin that astounded scientists have dubbed "extraordinary," "huge," and "whopping."

It maintains the trajectory for the hottest year on record, which is predicted to be 1.4C higher than pre-industrial times.

The new record is only the most recent to be broken this year; new highs were also achieved in June, July, and August.

Scientists have warned of impending worsening and are blaming it mostly on climate change. However, they also attributed it to natural weather variations and a warm weather cycle known as El Nino.

The average surface air temperature worldwide was 16.38C (61.484F) in September, according to the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S).

Professor Ed Hawkins, a climate scientist at Reading University, stated, "It's huge." By this margin, we shouldn't be setting records.

The differences between each month of the year are typically fairly tiny, according to Piers Forster, a professor of climate change at Leeds University and the interim chair of the government's Climate Change Committee.

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Breaking the previous September record by a staggering 0.5C, he said, "is crazy and shows something really bizarre is going on in the oceans."

According to Prof. Forster, greenhouse gases have been warming not only the atmosphere but also the deep ocean, particularly in the Atlantic, and now a change in ocean circulation is "causing some of that heat from the deeper ocean to resurface and bite us"

Samantha Burgess, D.O., assistant

The statistic represents the largest temperature increase since at least 1940 and is significantly (by 0.5C) higher than the previous warmest September of all time in 2020.

In Sikkim, India, flash floods caused by cloudbursts claim 10 lives and leave over 100 people missing.

Stranded tourists crossing a river with the help of Border Roads Organisation personnel in Chungthang, in the Indian state of Sikkim, due to landslides amid torrential rains. — AFP/File

The number of missing individuals has increased to 102, including 22, according to Indian police, who said on Thursday that at least 10 people have died after flash floods destroyed the northern state of Sikkim.

Over 3,000 visitors were left stranded and 14 people perished as a result of the severe floods brought on by the big cloudburst, which prompted the state administration to send hundreds of search and rescue personnel to help the afflicted districts.

23 persons were previously reported missing as a result of the floods.

According to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he assured Chief Minister Prem Singh Tamang of his support in a conversation on Wednesday.

After a cloudburst on Tuesday night, the state's Lhonak Lake breached its embankment, causing an alarming rise in water in the Teesta River.