<p class="title">The Philippines health department on Friday confirmed it had detected a second case of the poliovirus this week, as the virus re-emerges in the country 19 years after it was declared polio-free.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The second case was a five-year-old boy in Laguna, south of the capital Manila. The department announced on Thursday that a three-year-old girl had tested positive earlier this week in Lanao del Sur. The two provinces are about 1,400 km (870 miles) apart.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Philippine officials on Friday said they were preparing to vaccinate millions of children against polio to halt an outbreak of a disease it believed to have been eradicated.</p>.<p class="bodytext">It comes as the Philippines grapples to tackle twin outbreaks of dengue and measles that have killed more than 1,000 people since January, most of them children. </p>
<p class="title">The Philippines health department on Friday confirmed it had detected a second case of the poliovirus this week, as the virus re-emerges in the country 19 years after it was declared polio-free.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The second case was a five-year-old boy in Laguna, south of the capital Manila. The department announced on Thursday that a three-year-old girl had tested positive earlier this week in Lanao del Sur. The two provinces are about 1,400 km (870 miles) apart.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Philippine officials on Friday said they were preparing to vaccinate millions of children against polio to halt an outbreak of a disease it believed to have been eradicated.</p>.<p class="bodytext">It comes as the Philippines grapples to tackle twin outbreaks of dengue and measles that have killed more than 1,000 people since January, most of them children. </p>