The findings come after an unvaccinated adult in Rockland County contracted polio, suffered paralysis and had to be hospitalized last month.

Polio was subsequently found in Rockland County wastewater samples.

"These environmental findings — which further indicate potential community spread — in addition to the paralytic polio case identified among a Rockland County resident, underscore the urgency of every New York adult and child getting immunized against polio, especially those in the greater New York metropolitan area," New York health officials said.

The polio strain the adult in Rockland County caught suggests the chain of transmission did not begin in the United States.

The polio case in New York is genetically linked to the Rockland County wastewater sample as well as samples from the greater Jerusalem area in Israel and London in the United Kingdom.

"New Yorkers should know that this does not imply that the individual case identified in Rockland County, New York has travel history to Israel or the UK," the New York state health department said.