(4 minutes read)
· World Health organization (WHO) declared that polio is eradicated from African continent
· The continent witnessed four consecutive years without a reported case of polio, thanks to massive efforts to immunize children
· This announcement was made by the WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, at a virtual meeting with the Nigerian industrialist and philanthropist Aliko Dangote and American billionaire, Bill Gates. Nigeria is the last African country free of the wild polio
World Health organization (WHO) declared that polio is eradicated from African continent. The continent witnessed four consecutive years without a reported case of polio, thanks to massive efforts to immunize children.
This announcement was made by the WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, at a virtual meeting with the Nigerian industrialist and philanthropist Aliko Dangote and American billionaire, Bill Gates. Nigeria is the last African country free of the wild polio. It has been thirty years since Nigeria has been waging a war against polio
According to the protocol laid by WHO, it takes three years without a reported case to obtain WHO approval for giving eradication status to a country. However, WHO waited for four years, to be 100% sure, before declaring continent free of the disease.
Polio mainly affects children, attacking the spinal cord causing irreversible paralysis. It is an infectious disease and was an endemic disease throughout the world till a vaccine was discovered in the 1950s.
Some twenty-five years ago, thousands of children in Africa were afflicted by the virus leading to paralysis. Afghanistan and Pakistan are the two countries, from where polio incidences are still being reported. The polio vaccine protects children for life. Nigeria accounted for more than half of all global cases less than a decade ago. The vaccination campaign in Nigeria involved a huge effort to reach remote and dangerous places. Some health workers lost their lives while carrying out the eradication works.
