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UN News | November 17, 2003
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POLIO COULD BE WIPED OUT IN A YEAR IF
GOVERNMENTS MARSHALLED POLITICAL WILL-UN
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New
York --
Polio, which is being transported to previously polio-free
countries, could be eradicated globally within a year, if
governments showed the political will, experts from two United
Nations agencies said today.
David Heymann, the representative for polio eradication for World
Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Lee Jong-wook, told a
press briefing that the transmission of polio had been cut by 99 per
cent since the initiative to wipe it out was launched in 1988.
The virus was now virtually confined to seven countries:
Afghanistan, Egypt, India, northern Nigeria, Niger, Pakistan and
Somalia, he said, and of those countries, India, Pakistan and
Nigeria accounted for 95 per cent of the cases recorded.
Up to 12 November, however, 12 cases of paralytic polio had appeared
in previously polio-free countries: Burkina Faso, Chad, Ghana,
Lebanon and Togo and the emergency response cost $20 million, Dr.
Heymann said.
In addition, the risk of importation was magnified by a funding
deficit of $210 million for widespread immunization, he said.
The eradication effort, the largest public health initiative in
history, was started when new cases of polio numbered about 1,000
per day, but that number had dropped to 520 for all of last year, he
said.
The Deputy Executive Director of the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF),
Dr. Kul Gautam, told the briefing that the 99 per cent eradication
over 15 years had been accomplished at a cost of $3 billion.
About $50 million a year would now be needed to monitor the disease
and isolate importations, he said, because the affected countries
had a large combined population of 1 billion people.
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