Polio News
Posted by Bob Ruehl
on Dec 23, 2014
The Huffington Post calls this one of the most exciting health stories of 2014.
We're Getting Closer To Defeating Polio For Good
There are three different types of Polio, a devastating, highly infectious
viral disease that can cause death and permanent paralysis. Type 2
poliovirus appears to have been gone since 1999, and the world has now gone
two years without encountering a case of Type 3 poliovirus, says Dr. Walter
Orenstein, Associate Director of Emory Vaccine Center and the
president-elect of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases.
"While that's still too short a time to be certain, it gives great
encouragement to the principle that two of the three polio types may be
eradicated," said Orenstein to HuffPost. Cases of Type 1 poliovirus are
mostly concentrated in countries like Pakistan, which had 276 cases this
year, and Afghanistan, which had 24 cases.
"We're marching closer and closer to polio eradication," said Orenstein.
Societies can prevent polio with widespread vaccination campaigns, and the
U.S. eradicated the disease in 1979.
Lima Rotary Club is a part of D6600 and Zone 29.
We keep the folks in Michigan from falling down on us!