2004-10-10
This is Gwen Outen with the VOA Special English Development
Report.
Health workers in West and Central Africa have been carrying out
a campaign to protect eighty million children from polio. The
vaccination effort involves twenty-three countries. Organizers call
it "the single-largest public health campaign in history."
The workers are going house to house. They want to make sure
every child below the age of five is vaccinated. The first part of
the campaign began Friday and continues through Tuesday.
The polio vaccine is taken by
mouth. The first child to receive the drops of liquid was Zainab
Ibrahim Shekaru. She is the one-year-old daughter of the governor of
Kano state in Nigeria.
Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo gave the baby the vaccine at
a ceremony in Kano on October second. Other African leaders also
attended. Mister Obasanjo directed all Nigerians to stay at home
this past Saturday morning so children could be immunized.
Polio is caused by a virus. The virus is spread through body
fluids and also water or food handled by an infected person. People
who get the disease often lose the ability to move their arms or
legs. Some die from polio. There is no cure. But polio can be
prevented. To work best, the vaccine is given to children several
times during their first few years of life.
Since two thousand three, there have been new cases in twelve
African countries that had been free of polio. Polio began to spread
in Africa last year after Kano and other states in northern Nigeria
stopped immunization efforts. Islamic religious leaders had claimed
that the vaccine was harmful. But the leaders have declared the
current supplies to be safe.
The next National Immunization Days are set from November
eighteenth to the twenty-second. Children will also have the chance
to receive vitamin A, which is important for good health.
The campaign is led by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative.
This program includes the United Nations Children's Fund and the
World Health Organization. Rotary International and the United
States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are also involved.
World health officials set a goal to end polio by two thousand
five. The W.H.O. counted seven hundred fifty-four new cases in the
world this year through the end of September. Three-fourths were in
Nigeria.
This VOA Special English Development Report was written by Karen
Leggett. This is Gwen Outen.