WHO Declares Africa Polio Free
The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared that the entire continent of Africa is now free of the wild poliovirus. This comes after four years without a single case.
With this historic milestone, five of the six WHO regions — representing over 90% of the world’s population — are now free of the disease. If it can be eradicated everywhere, polio will be the second infectious disease, after smallpox, to be eliminated.
In 1996, South African President Nelson Mandela, with the support of Rotary International, started the Kick Polio Out of Africa campaign, encouraging leaders across the continent to increase their efforts to reach every child with the polio vaccine.
At the time, polio was paralyzing an estimated 75,000 children annually on the African continent. Since then, 9 billion oral polio vaccines have prevented nearly 2 million cases of wild poliovirus on the continent, according to the WHO.
"We have made tremendous progress working with community leaders," said Carol Pandak, who leads Rotary International's Polio Plus Program, speaking to VOA. She said they also worked with military officials to help deliver vaccines to children they would not otherwise have been able to reach due to conflict.
Funding and support were provided by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative. The initiative is led by national governments with six partners: the WHO, Rotary International, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the United Nations Children’s Fund, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.
The effort also involved a huge network to check sewage for the virus and test cases of paralysis.
However, Pandak says the work is not done, and that it's important that communities continue to vaccinate their children against polio.
The polio eradication effort demonstrates two things according to Nigerian Health Minister Dr. Muhammad Ali Pate: that people around the world can come together to accomplish great things, and that vaccines work.
Polio still exists along the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Until the virus is knocked out of that region, children everywhere are at risk of contracting the disease.
A girl is vaccinated during a polio eradication campaign in Kabul, Afghanistan.
