Over 17 million Congolese children aged between 0 and 5 years will be vaccinated against polio during the second phase of National Vaccination Days (JNV) scheduled to run from Aug. 15 to 17 across the entire national territory, the Health Minister Felix Kabange Numbi has said.

The minister was speaking on Tuesday when he addressed a press conference in Kinshasa together with the representative of the World Health Organization (WHO) in DR Congo and Sylvie Fouet, the deputy representative of UNICEF.

He appealed to parents to ensure their children are immunized and to facilitate the work of the health workers who will be moving from door-to-door.

The minister said the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo) had managed to stop the spread of the deadly polio virus on its national territory between 2001 and 2005, but it reappeared in 2006 after it was brought in from outside.

Since January 2012, he said, DR Congo had not detected any new case of polio.

He noted that the vaccination campaign to be carried out in August 2013 is meant to consolidate the achievements of the first phase of the immunization campaign that was organized between July 11 and 13, 2013.

Polio is a viral disease that is highly infectious and attacks the nervous system, leaving the victim crippled. It can be prevented through vaccination.