Originally published October 14 2005
Fight against polio will take longer than expected
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
A $4 billion effort led by the World Health Organization had projected it would stop transmission of polio by the end of 2005, but officials now think it will be another year before the virus is contained.
GENEVA - A U.N.-led campaign conceded on Wednesday that it would miss its target of halting the spread of polio worldwide by year-end, saying it would take another year to complete the job in northern Nigeria.
The $4 billion effort, begun in 1988 and led by the World Health Organization, had hoped to halt transmission this year of the crippling virus, which can cause irreversible paralysis in children within hours.
But polio spread from Nigeria in the past two years to 18 countries, mainly in West and Central Africa, but also jumping as far as Yemen, after the northern Nigeria state of Kano banned immunizations for a 10-month period in 2003-2004.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------"The group concluded that at least a further 12 months were needed to finish the job in Nigeria," said a statement issued by the Advisory Committee on Polio Eradication after Geneva talks.
The committee is an independent, technical oversight body of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, a partnership linking the WHO, the U.N. Children's Fund, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Rotary International.
Nigeria remains the single greatest risk to eradication," David Heymann, WHO's representative for polio eradication, told a briefing.
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