Nigeria’s health minister, Isaac Adewole, has confirmed that there has been a fresh outbreak of polio in the north eastern state of Borno State.

Two children in Gwoza and Jere local government areas of the state were affected, according to a statement  on Thursday, August 11, 2016 signed by Olajide Oshundun, a spokesperson in the federal health ministry.

“Our overriding priority right now is to rapidly boost immunity in the affected areas to ensure that no more children are affected by this terrible disease,” Professor Adewole said in the statement.

“A national emergency response team comprising government and partners to Borno state will be deployed for immediate and robust vaccination campaign, targeting eligible children to prevent the spread of the virus locally and internationally.”

The new polio cases are the first to be recorded in Nigeria in two years.

Under former President Goodluck Jonathan, the federal government worked to end the preventable disease in the country. So much that Nigeria was declared polio free and set on the path to be declared polio free by the World Health Organisation in 2017.

Only this week health and development partners lamented that the federal ministry of finance is still withholding N13 billion allocated in the 2016 budget for routine immunisation of kids, warning that this could reverse the gains recorded under the previous administration.

The health ministry said in its statement that as an immediate response, one million children are to be immunised in four local government areas in Borno state, while another four million will be immunised in the adjoining states of Yobe, Adamawa and Gombe.