The World Health Organization has extended for another three months its declaration that the international spread of poliovirus remains a public health emergency of international concern, warning that wild poliovirus transmission continues in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The decision was made by the WHO’s Emergency Committee on the international spread of poliovirus at its 45th meeting, convened in May and announced Aug. 25.

The committee unanimously concluded that the risk of international spread of poliovirus continues to constitute a public health emergency of international concern, or PHEIC. It also determined that the situation does not constitute a pandemic emergency.

Afghanistan and Pakistan remain the world’s only countries with endemic transmission of wild poliovirus type 1, or WPV1.

Since the committee’s previous meeting in January, 16 new WPV1 cases have been reported in the two countries — 14 in Afghanistan and two in Pakistan. Of Afghanistan’s 14 newly reported cases, 11 had paralysis onset in 2025.