The end of Polio!

Growing up in Africa I’ve learned that people deal with a lot different diseases, and polio was one of them that a lot of people were facing in Burundi and some other countries in the world are dealing with, too. Polio is an infectious disease that is caused by a subgroup of viruses. Polio actually comes from the term poliomyelitis which is Greek. Polio was first found in 1789, and the first outbreaks occurred in Europe and the United States in the early nineteenth centuries. By then it was spreading in a lot of different places, and by 1952 more than 21,000 people in the U.S. were paralyzed.

Polio attacks children under the age of five more than anybody else and only humans can carry it. People get polio from direct exposure to an infected individual and, more rarely, by eating foods contaminated with waste products from the intestines and/or droplets of moisture (saliva) from an infected person. The symptoms of someone with polio are fever, fatigue, headache, sore throat, and vomiting which will develop three to five days after exposure. When you recover from the minor illnesses, which take about 24-72 hours, the symptoms of the major illnesses appear without a previous minor illness and it usually affects older children and adults.

The head of WHO said if the wealthy donor countries contribute $1.2 billion the world has a chance of stamping out polio in two years. The WHO Director –General Margaret Chan said in the meeting in Geneva that if they don’t meet this virus with immediate commitment that this virus might win. She said that this is a great opportunity, and they shouldn't miss it.

If polio is not treated early, it causes paralysis, deformed limbs and, in the most severe cases, death by asphyxiation. The number of people who were infected by the polio virus have dropped to 30, 000 a year in 1980 to 2,000 today. This is very good and it shows that if those rich countries would donate money they can get rid of it for good in this world. If the world works together they can actually do something and not have to deal with this disease again. Some countries like India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nigeria are facing the outbreak of polio. Nigeria has two-thirds of the almost 1,800 new cases of polio worldwide each year, but the people said that it is because the polio vaccine was tainted with HIV/AIDS. People are not sure if this is true of not, but some people believe it.
Some of the countries like Kenya, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Bangladesh have been clear of polio. Kenya has been free from polio for about 22 years before two children were found infected by the border of Somalia in 2006. The country responded with the national three- week vaccination campaign for children under five years old. Kenyan Frederick Ouko was struck with polio when he was 18 months old and suffered shame and stigma from a highly superstitious society growing up. He talks about how people face health problems because of this disease but they face problems with society, too. He said that when he was young, people would make fun of him, stare at him, and make him feel like he did something wrong and they didn’t understand why he was disabled. These countries are having problems with getting vaccinations. I understand that countries such as Somalia and Afghanistan are facing warfare and weak governments which is why they can’t afford to provide vaccination campaigns, and that’s why the WHO decided to have a meeting in Geneva so that they can do something about it. If they come up with the money they can help everyone fight this virus. This is a virus that has affected the world; they can’t just leave it to each country to do its part because polio is a virus that can be imported from one country to another. Dr. Mohammed Duale of WHO in Kenya said polio was not an indigenous virus in Kenya, it was imported from Somalia, and the virus from Somalia came from Yemen. Which means that if one country wants to be safe it has to help other countries to fight against polio.