Shiloh
Editor, Senior Moderator
Source: http://www.liberianobserver.com/node/3497
Polio Vaccination Campaign Kicks off Today in Montserrado County
Publication Date: December 17, 2009 - 3:23am
Updated: December 17, 2009 - 4:15pm
Children Under Five Vaccinated Free of Charge
By:
Stephen Binda
MONROVIA ? Liberia?s health authorities, in collaboration with their development partners, will today, December 17, 2009 begin a nationwide polio eradication vaccination campaign in Montserrado County.
The campaign comes a few years after Liberia was certificated by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a polio-free country with a population of more than three million.
In August this year, health authorities reported that five of the country?s 15 counties had already been infected, with a total of eight cases confirmed in Bomi, Montserrado, Maryland, River Gee and Grand Gedeh counties.
The vaccination campaign, according to health authorities, will run from December 17 - 21 and is expected to target more than 50,000 children across Montserrado County.
Speaking to reporters Wednesday in Monrovia, the team leader of the Ministry of Health (MOH), Promotion Division, Chris Dagadu said following the vaccination campaign in Montserrado County, the rest of the counties will be targeted beginning in January 2010.
She explained that the MOH and its partners have already secured professional health workers to carry out the immunization of the children within the five-day period.
Children under the age of five will be vaccinated free of charge in order to arrest the rapid spread of the disease in the country, the MOH official said.
Dagadu attributed the re-emergence of the virus into the country to the inflow of people from foreign countries, particularly from neighboring states where the disease remains active.
Liberia is bordered to the north by the Republic of Guinea, to the east by Ivory Coast, to the west by Sierra Leone and to the south by the Atlantic Ocean.
Ivory Coast, Guinea and Nigeria are countries in the West African sub-region where the prevailing rate of the disease remains high.
?People leaving and coming into Liberia, using our borders by way of either Ivory Coast or Guinea, are some of the root causes of the recurrence of the virus in Liberia,? Dagadu told reporters yesterday.
The MOH official described the re-emergence of the virus in Liberia as a worrisome situation for the country on grounds that the disease has no cure.
It is not yet clear how much the authorities are pumping into the campaign; but individuals close to the Health Ministry have hinted to the Daily Observer the government and its partners sought funding in the amount of US$380,000 to combat the disease.
In August of this year, health authorities informed members of the National Legislature that Bomi, Montserrado and Grand Gedeh had each recorded one case of polio, Maryland County two, and that River Gee County was handling three cases.
Health reports on the polio virus disclose that Ivory Coast registered at least 21 confirmed cases of polio, Guinea 15, and that Nigeria reported 360 cases this year.
Poliomyelitis (infantile paralysis) has estimated to have been eradicated from nearly every country in the world since the approval of the use of the Salk (1955) and Sabin (1962) vaccines.
The WHO reports that no more than 1,500 cases of acute poliomyelitis had been reported in 2001.
The number of countries in which polio is endemic dropped from 20 in 2001 to 10 at the beginning of 2002. The WHO target date for declaring the world polio-free was 2005.
The organization estimates that there are 20 million people worldwide with some degree of disability caused by poliomyelitis. A 1996 National Center for Health Statistics survey reported a preliminary estimate of one million survivors in the United States.
About 450,000 of them reported paralysis resulting in some form of impairment. For years, most of these polio survivors lived active lives, their memory of polio long forgotten, their health status stable. In the late ?70s, however, polio survivors were noting new problems of fatigue, pain and additional weakness.
0Copyright Liberian Observer - All Rights Reserved. This article cannot be re-published without the expressed, written consent of the Liberian Observer. Please contact us for more information or to request publishing permission.
Polio Vaccination Campaign Kicks off Today in Montserrado County
Publication Date: December 17, 2009 - 3:23am
Updated: December 17, 2009 - 4:15pm
Children Under Five Vaccinated Free of Charge
By:
Stephen Binda
MONROVIA ? Liberia?s health authorities, in collaboration with their development partners, will today, December 17, 2009 begin a nationwide polio eradication vaccination campaign in Montserrado County.
The campaign comes a few years after Liberia was certificated by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a polio-free country with a population of more than three million.
In August this year, health authorities reported that five of the country?s 15 counties had already been infected, with a total of eight cases confirmed in Bomi, Montserrado, Maryland, River Gee and Grand Gedeh counties.
The vaccination campaign, according to health authorities, will run from December 17 - 21 and is expected to target more than 50,000 children across Montserrado County.
Speaking to reporters Wednesday in Monrovia, the team leader of the Ministry of Health (MOH), Promotion Division, Chris Dagadu said following the vaccination campaign in Montserrado County, the rest of the counties will be targeted beginning in January 2010.
She explained that the MOH and its partners have already secured professional health workers to carry out the immunization of the children within the five-day period.
Children under the age of five will be vaccinated free of charge in order to arrest the rapid spread of the disease in the country, the MOH official said.
Dagadu attributed the re-emergence of the virus into the country to the inflow of people from foreign countries, particularly from neighboring states where the disease remains active.
Liberia is bordered to the north by the Republic of Guinea, to the east by Ivory Coast, to the west by Sierra Leone and to the south by the Atlantic Ocean.
Ivory Coast, Guinea and Nigeria are countries in the West African sub-region where the prevailing rate of the disease remains high.
?People leaving and coming into Liberia, using our borders by way of either Ivory Coast or Guinea, are some of the root causes of the recurrence of the virus in Liberia,? Dagadu told reporters yesterday.
The MOH official described the re-emergence of the virus in Liberia as a worrisome situation for the country on grounds that the disease has no cure.
It is not yet clear how much the authorities are pumping into the campaign; but individuals close to the Health Ministry have hinted to the Daily Observer the government and its partners sought funding in the amount of US$380,000 to combat the disease.
In August of this year, health authorities informed members of the National Legislature that Bomi, Montserrado and Grand Gedeh had each recorded one case of polio, Maryland County two, and that River Gee County was handling three cases.
Health reports on the polio virus disclose that Ivory Coast registered at least 21 confirmed cases of polio, Guinea 15, and that Nigeria reported 360 cases this year.
Poliomyelitis (infantile paralysis) has estimated to have been eradicated from nearly every country in the world since the approval of the use of the Salk (1955) and Sabin (1962) vaccines.
The WHO reports that no more than 1,500 cases of acute poliomyelitis had been reported in 2001.
The number of countries in which polio is endemic dropped from 20 in 2001 to 10 at the beginning of 2002. The WHO target date for declaring the world polio-free was 2005.
The organization estimates that there are 20 million people worldwide with some degree of disability caused by poliomyelitis. A 1996 National Center for Health Statistics survey reported a preliminary estimate of one million survivors in the United States.
About 450,000 of them reported paralysis resulting in some form of impairment. For years, most of these polio survivors lived active lives, their memory of polio long forgotten, their health status stable. In the late ?70s, however, polio survivors were noting new problems of fatigue, pain and additional weakness.
0Copyright Liberian Observer - All Rights Reserved. This article cannot be re-published without the expressed, written consent of the Liberian Observer. Please contact us for more information or to request publishing permission.