- Title: EGYPT/INDIA: INTERNATIONAL AUTHORITIES LAUNCH ANTI- POLIO CAMPAIGN
- Date: 5th April 1995
- Summary: CAIRO, EGYPT/TARAN, LEBANON/DEGRABAM, WEST BENGAL, INDIA APRIL 5/6, 1995/RECENT/FILE CAIRO, EGYPT (APRIL 5/6, 1995)(RTV) 1. SV/MCU CHILDREN WAITING OUTSIDE OM KHENAN VACCINE CENTRE (2 SHOTS)0.11 2. SV DOCTORS ADMINISTERING POLIO VACCINE TO CHILDREN(4 SHOTS)0.39 3. SV CHILDREN AFTER RECEIVING THEIR VACCINE 0.45 4. SV EGYPTIAN
- Embargoed: 20th April 1995 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: CAIRO, EGYPT/TARAN, LEBANON/DEBAGRAM, WEST BENGAL, INDIA
- City:
- Country: Lebanon AFRICA ASIA Egypt MIDDLE EAST India
- Reuters ID: LVA7E3UXCDS22B75J7DG20Q2GPEZ
- Story Text: Forty years after the first polio vaccine was developed, thousands of people still contract the crippling disease every year.
To coincide with World Health Day on Friday (April 7) international authorities are launching a massive anti-polio campaign, as part of an effort to rid the planet of the disease by the turn of the century.
Egypt's Expanded Program on Immunisation (EPI) efforts are widely considered to be among the most successful in the developing world.
In particular, the Polio eradication intiative has made great strides toward its current goal of making Egypt free of poliomyelitis cases by the end of 1995, and declaring Egypt to be officially polio free in 1997.
Egyptian Health Minsiter Dr Ali Abdel Fatah said polio was a major problem 50 years ago and when the government started to immunise the children conditions improved.
In many parts of the world mass immunisation starts off on a small scale.
A nurse in the remote Lebanese village of Taran, on her way to see a one-day old baby, carries the polio vaccine in her cooler box.
A tiny drop is all that's needed, to hopefully protect the child for life against the killer disease.
Lebanon is one of 18 countries around the world which are taking part in a massive anti-polio campaign. Backed by international organisations such as UNICEF, the World Health Organisation and Rotary, the aim is to rid the planet of the disease.
In Lebanon, mobile health teams are visiting hundreds of towns and villages throughout the country. They hope to vaccinate more than 350 thousand children under the age of five, so they will never again have to worry about the disease.
Polio was once one of the most feared viruses in the world. In the 1940s and 1950s, polio epidemics swept through the United States, paralysing hundreds of children and causing panic across the country. But in the 1950s, Dr Jonas Salk developed the first Polio vaccine, and mass imunisation programmes began.
It was an international effort, under the patronage of famous polio survivors like American President Franklin Roosevelt.
Since then, hundreds of millions of children around the world have been vaccinated against polio - the disease has now officially been eradicated from large parts of the world, including Western Europe and the Americas.
While that's a major achievement in itself, much still needs to be done elsewhere in the world.
At least 70 countries are still reporting polio cases. There HAS been a decline amongst developing nations, but even so, there were still an estimated 10 thousand new cases in 1994.
But the campaign faces many problems. On Wednesday (April 5) crowds attacked and set fire to a health care centre in the eastern Indian state of West Bengal.
It followed the death of three infants after polio and measles vaccinations at tha rural health centre in Debagram, about 100 kilometres from state capital Calcutta.
The exact cause of the deaths - during vaccination for measles or polio - is still being investigated.
The state government immediately stopped all immunisation programmes and ordered an inquiry into the incident, which has dealt a setback to the World Health Organisation's projects in the state.
Reports suggest that contaminated vials of polio or measles vaccine could be the cause of death.
The state's Minister for Family Welfare, Chhaya Bera, however, said the vaccines could not be the cause of death as the hopitals strictly follow procedures for preserving the vaccines. She did not want to guess the cause of death but did not rule out the possibility of the measles vaccine being the cause.
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