In 1991, the last case of indigenous polio in the Western Hemisphere occurred in a 5-year-old boy, Luis Fermin Tenorio, in Pichanaqui, Peru.

The Peruvian campaign against wild poliomyelitis was remarkable for its success under adverse conditions. The late 1980s and early 1990s were years of economic hyperinflation and political violence in Peru.

The limited epidemiological records for Peru in existence for the pre-1985 period indicate that polio morbidity rates in the country averaged 0.7 cases per 100,000 inhabitants from 1939 to 1951.