A 34-strong party of Rotary Volunteers from the UK have described their experiences of immunising children in one of poorest states of India against polio as life changing.
The party have just returned from the latest National Immunisation Day which targeted 157 million children under five in Lucknow, found in the Northern State of Uttar Pradesh.
Led by Rotary District Governor John Philip, the team is the largest ever group from the UK to take part in an immunisation day and was responsible for helping to set up special immunisation booths, transport the vaccine and immunise the children.
The trip came just days after it was announced that Rotary International, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and the British and German governments committed more than £450 million (US$630 million) in new funds to fight polio.
John Philip, Rotary leader for Yorkshire where 29 of the volunteers came from, said: “It was truly remarkable. We walked the slums of Lucknow, stood at traffic junctions, staffed temporary ‘booths’ in street corners, knocked at doors, and assisted the staff in Lucknow to immunise countless children. The children came on foot, on rickshaws, on bikes and motorbikes and there were Muslim women in burqua and Indians in sarees, queuing together, with their babies for the two drops of polio vaccine to protect them from polio.
‘We were there to boost the campaign and help local Rotarians, health workers and volunteers in their relentless campaign against this scourge.
‘Today polio may be considered as not our problem. But, we live in a global village. What is India’s problem today, could become our problem tomorrow. We must pledge our support to the dedication and commitment of the people involved in eradicating polio. Polio is only a plane ride away from the UK.”
Fellow team member Janet Quinlan from Lancashire said: “We got to see firsthand what Rotary is raising money to achieve. It was truly humbling and life changing for me. Smiling children seemed delighted to see us and came out to meet us wherever we went and wanted to shake our hands and get us to sign things. I felt like a VIP!”
In 1985, Rotary pledged to eradicate Polio from the World. Since then reported cases of Polio have dropped by 99.8%. There were less than 1,600 word-wide last year and the number of endemic countries has fallen from 125 countries to just four – India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nigeria. Since Rotary’s campaign started, more than two billion children have been vaccinated and five million children who would otherwise have been polio victims are today alive and walking.
For more information about Rotary’s polio eradication initiative and to find out how you can help, visit www.ribi.org/foundation/polio.
13/02/09
