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polio vaccination
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has announced that a “major milestone” in the battle to eliminate polio globally has been reached.
CDC experts think a second of the three forms of poliovirus has been eliminated after mass vaccination campaigns.
Wild poliovirus type 3 has not been detected for more than two years. Type 2 was eradicated in 1999.
Experts said the world was “closer than ever” to defeating polio but the situation in Pakistan was worrying.
Polio is highly infectious and causes paralysis in up to one in 200 people. Some children die when the muscles that help them breathe stop working.
However, there has been huge progress in eliminating the disease. Cases have fallen from 350,000 in 1988 to 416 in 2013.
According to the CDC report, the last case of type 3 poliovirus was detected in Pakistan in November 2012.
“We may have eradicated a second of three; that’s a major milestone,” said Dr. Stephen Cochi, a senior adviser at the CDC’s Centre for Global Health.
However, a formal process – involving the Polio Global Certification Commission – is required before type 3 can be officially declared eradicated. That will not take place for at least another year.
Type 1 remains endemic in three countries – Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nigeria.
There has been progress in Nigeria, where cases have fallen to six so far this year from 53 in 2013.
Cases have leap from 59 last year to 236 and counting in 2014.
The Pakistani Taliban stopped polio vaccination programs in some tribal areas of the country for about two years.
Since the summer there has been a mass exodus of people from the region after military operations by Pakistan’s army.
It means there is a serious risk of polio spreading to other countries.
Polio virus traveled from Pakistan to Syria in 2013.
Twelve people, including polio vaccinators, have been killed in two shootings at health centres in northern Nigeria.
In the first attack in Kano four polio vaccinators were shot dead by gunmen who drove up on a motor tricycle.
Thirty minutes later gunmen opened fire on women waiting with their children in Hotoro, outside Kano city.
In 2003, northern Nigeria’s Muslim leaders opposed polio vaccinations, claiming they could cause infertility.
Kano banned motorbikes from carrying passengers after a recent attack on the prominent Muslim leader, the emir of Kano.
Residents said that those injured in the shooting at the health centre there had been taken to hospital.
Twelve people, including polio vaccinators, have been killed in two shootings at health centres in northern Nigeria
It is not clear if health workers were among the casualties in Hotoro, where gunmen also approached using a motor tricycle.
Analysts believe the attack last month on the emir of Kano may have been the work of the militant Islamist group Boko Haram.
The group – whose name translates as “Western education is forbidden” – says it is fighting to overthrow the government and impose Sharia.
It has been blamed for the deaths of some 1,400 people in central and northern Nigeria since 2010.
Nigeria is one of only three countries where polio is still endemic.
The United Nations has suspended an anti-polio campaign in Pakistan after three more health workers died in the latest of a spate of gun attacks.
Attacks in the Peshawar region killed a female vaccination supervisor and her driver, as well as a student volunteer.
Coming after five deaths on Tuesday, the UN said it was suspending its three-day vaccination drive.
No group has claimed responsibility, but the Taliban have issued threats against the UN’s anti-polio campaign.
Pakistan is one of just three countries where the disease is still endemic.
The UN children’s agency Unicef and the World Health Organization were suspending work on the programme nationwide after Wednesday’s bloodshed, said Unicef spokesman Michael Coleman.
The programme was halted in Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces on Tuesday after four female health workers were shot dead in the city, while another female worker was killed in an attack in Peshawar.
The vaccination supervisor and her driver died when their car was sprayed by gunmen riding motorbikes in Charsadda district, north of Peshawar, police said.
The student volunteer was shot in the head when gunmen on two motorbikes fired at a team of vaccinators in a northern suburb of Peshawar.
The UN has suspended an anti-polio campaign in Pakistan after three more health workers died in the latest of a spate of gun attacks
Gunmen riding motorbikes also shot at polio vaccinators in another area of Charsadda and in the adjoining district of Nowshera, although no injuries were reported.
Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf on Tuesday condemned the attacks and praised the work of the polio vaccination teams, calling on regional authorities to guarantee their safety.
Wednesday is the final day of a three-day nationwide anti-polio drive – during which an estimated 5.2 million polio drops were to be administered.
There has been opposition to such immunization drives in parts of Pakistan, particularly after a fake CIA hepatitis vaccination campaign helped to locate Osama Bin Laden in 2011.
Militants have kidnapped and killed foreign NGO workers in the past in an attempt to halt the immunization drives, which they say are part of efforts to spy on them.
Afghanistan and Nigeria are the only other countries where polio is still endemic.
Pakistan is considered the key battleground in the global fight against the disease, which attacks the nervous system and can cause permanent paralysis within hours of infection.
Almost 200 children were paralyzed in the country in 2011 – the worst figures in 15 years.
Earlier this year, the Global Polio Eradication Initiative warned that tackling the disease had entered “emergency mode” after “explosive” outbreaks in countries previously free of polio.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said polio was at a tipping point, with experts fearing it could “come back with a vengeance” after large outbreaks in Africa and Tajikistan and China’s first recorded cases for more than a decade.
Declaring polio a national emergency, the Pakistani government is targeting 33 million children for vaccination with some 88,000 health workers delivering vaccination drops.
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Five female Pakistani polio vaccination workers have been fatally shot in a string of co-ordinated attacks – four within 20 minutes across Karachi.
The fifth woman was shot and wounded in the city of Peshawar in the north-west and later died of her injuries.
A UN-backed programme to eradicate polio – which is endemic in Pakistan – has been suspended in Karachi.
No group has said it carried out the shootings, but the Taliban have issued threats against the polio drive.
“These were pre-planned and co-ordinated attacks in various localities which took place within a span of 20 minutes,” Imran Javed, a police spokesman said of Tuesday’s attacks in Karachi.
Earlier reports said a male health worker had been shot dead in Karachi on Monday, but officials now say his death was not related to the polio vaccination drive.
Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf has condemned the attacks and praised the work of the polio vaccination teams, calling on regional authorities to guarantee their safety, Pakistan’s APP news agency reported.
Five female Pakistani polio vaccination workers have been fatally shot in a string of co-ordinated attacks
Pakistani health officials said the latest three-day nationwide anti-polio drive – during which an estimated 5.2 million polio drops were to be administered – had been suspended in Karachi, Pakistan’s largest city with a population of 18 million.
There has been opposition to such immunization drives in parts of Pakistan, particularly after a fake CIA hepatitis vaccination campaign helped to locate Osama Bin Laden in 2011.
Militants have kidnapped and killed foreign NGO workers in the past in an attempt to halt the immunization drives, which they say are part of efforts to spy on them.
However, the Pakistani government “would continue to mount its effort on polio eradication,” said Raja Pervez Ashraf’s special adviser Shahnaz Wazir Ali.
Shahnaz Wazir Ali said protection would be provided to workers, and campaigns would be staggered if necessary.
“Clearly, we are now so close to eradicating the polio virus,… acts of this type, which are intended to dissuade us, will not deter us,” she said.
Along with Afghanistan and Nigeria, Pakistan is one of only three countries where polio is still endemic.
Pakistan is considered the key battleground in the global fight against the disease, which attacks the nervous system and can cause permanent paralysis within hours of infection.
Almost 200 children were paralyzed in the country in 2011 – the worst figures in 15 years.
Earlier this year, the Global Polio Eradication Initiative warned that tackling the disease had entered “emergency mode” after “explosive” outbreaks in countries previously free of polio.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said polio was at a tipping point, with experts fearing it could “come back with a vengeance” after large outbreaks in Africa and Tajikistan and China’s first recorded cases for more than a decade.
Declaring polio a national emergency, the Pakistani government is targeting 33 million children for vaccination with some 88,000 health workers delivering vaccination drops.
Dr. Bruce Aylward of the WHO said that vaccination programmes had been suspended in other countries before but that “when you’re dealing with something as basic as the health of children, usually there can be common ground found”.
He said he hoped for a “dialogue with community leaders who have positions of power to ensure root causes of this are being addressed and the perpetrators are brought to justice”.
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