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The Final Battle to End Polio

In 1988, a meeting of the World Health Assembly set a mind-boggling goal: to eradicate the ancient scourge of polio. At the time the goal was set, the polio virus was endemic in 125 countries and about 350,000 people, mostly children, were paralyzed by polio each year. This acute infectious disease causes no symptoms in 90% of people, but in 1%, the virus enters the nervous system and causes muscular destruction and paralysis. It was an audacious goal – but 24 years later, the number of polio cases worldwide had fallen by more than 99 percent, saving more than 10 million children from paralysis. How to End a Plague The near-eradication of polio took big public investment in vaccine. It required the organization of massive public education and vaccination programs, and the dedication of millions of workers and volunteers to the task. Polio is highly infectious, and entire villages and districts had to be vaccinated to stop the chain of transmission. Stamping it out meant recruiting and training hundreds of thousands of vaccinators and sending them into the field with millions of doses of vaccine, which had to be kept cold in foam-plastic boxes. Vaccinators went door to door in villages and cities, approached passengers at railway stations and on buses, and walked up to cars at toll plazas. The goal was to vaccinate every child in the country several times, with a month or so between each round. It was this kind of unprecedented effort that allowed India to declare itself polio-free in February 2012. India was long considered one of the most unlikely places to eradicate polio, because of its high population density, high rates of migration, poor sanitation, and low rates of routine immunization. But data-driven planning, well-trained and motivated staff, rigorous monitoring and political will at all levels made the difference. So did satellite technology. According to Bill Gates, whose Gates Foundation is funding the battle against polio in nations around the world, satellite imagery and mobile phones equipped with GPS are instrumental in the fight. India is now sharing its best practices with Nigeria, Afghanistan and Pakistan – countries where polio remains endemic – and the Nigerian experience shows just how technology can help a person-to-person effort achieve national scale. Read more: http://www.sspi.org/cpages/the-final-...