Polio epidemic ready to explode in Africa



June 23, 2004



BY JONATHAN FOWLER



GENEVA -- Africa is on the brink of the biggest polio epidemic in years, with the crippling disease hitting Nigeria hard and re-emerging in Sudan's war-ravaged Darfur region, the World Health Organization said Tuesday.



The number of polio cases globally has reached 333 so far this year, almost double the number for the same period last year. Total cases last year reached 783.



In Nigeria, where Muslim leaders have refused to participate in immunization programs, 257 cases have been reported this year.



''There is no question that the virus is spreading at an alarming pace,'' said Dr. David Heymann, who is overseeing the U.N. effort to eradicate the disease.



Polio is a water-borne disease that usually infects young children, attacking the nervous system and causing paralysis, muscular atrophy, deformation and sometimes death.



Nearly 1,000 children in 125 countries were being infected daily by polio in 1988 when WHO and other health organizations launched the Global Polio Eradication Initiative.



That number dropped to 483 for the whole of 2001, and health officials declared the disease was eradicated in Europe, the Americas, much of Asia and Australia.



Epidemiologists now fear a major epidemic this fall -- the start of the polio ''high season.'' The disease has appeared already in nine sub-Saharan African countries, after being limited to only two at the beginning of last year.



The battle against the disease has stalled in the face of resistance to immunization programs in Nigeria's heavily Muslim Kano state.



Some Islamic leaders claimed that the vaccines were part of a U.S.-led plot to spread infertility and AIDS among African Muslims.



AP

Russ,

The BS that the "masses" are willing to swallow is truely amazing sometimes. And as you mentioned, what can we expect of uneducated africans, when we ourselves in the "enlightend" west constantly fall for powerhungry conmen too... It would appear that mankind everywhere just loves being deceived.

As to us meddling with african healthcare again as usual, if they don't want it, I see no reason to force it on them. Perhaps letting them sort it out themselves would make a little dent in the african overpopulation problem.

Erik D.

The WHO is spreading B*ll Sh*T as usual. Rotary Internation is well on the way to eradicting polio in the few countries where is is still around. Our local Rotary club this year raised $25,000 this year for this international project. In the late 80's we raised over $80,000 for the original polio eradication project. It is Rotary International that has eradicated polio world wide.

Rotary has done some amazing work in attempting to eradicate polio. I saw a Rotary employee in a mini-bus in Burkina Faso who was enroute to remote villages to vaccinate folks. Burkina is one of the countries that still requires vaccinations for visitors (or at least did in the 90's.)



More power to Rotary in their efforts..... I'm old enough to remember the fears of my parents every summer. Polio is bad stuff and I hate to see good efforts politicised... but ignorance is power, sometimes.