With India expected to be declared polio free next month, forty Rotarians from Great Britain and Ireland are heading out to India to take part in National Immunisation Day (NID) on 23 February. They will be joining two million volunteers helping to vaccinate a further 170,000 children in the hope of ending this crippling disease in the country once and for all.
Mike Yates of the Rotary Club of Newmills Marple, who is organising the trip said: “India being declared polio free was once described by experts as impossible. This feat will therefore mark one of the greatest global public health achievements of all time. However, there is still lots of work to be done to ensure India remains polio free and that is why NID is critically important. We have to keep immunisation levels high to stop the potential for reinfection from countries where polio immunisation efforts have had to be suspended, like Pakistan.”
Rotary International has been at the forefront of the fight to end polio from the world since the 1980s when it joined forces with the WHO, UNICEF and the US Centers of Disease Control and Prevention to launch the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI).
Mike continued: “With the public’s help, we now have the chance to finally eradicate this disease and there has never been a better time to donate. This year, thanks to the Make History Today campaign launched jointly by Rotary International and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, funds donated will be matched 2:1 to a total of US$35m per year until 2018. Just £3 is enough to vaccinate seven children against polio, so I am urging everyone to get behind Rotary and help make history by ridding the world of this disease forever.”
