Even after 18 years and $5 billion spent, the anti-polio campaign has hacked the infection rate from some 350,000 cases a year to around 2,000, while the number of countries in which it is endemic has slumped to just four from 125.
Looking at the trend, WHO Director-General Margaret Chan has decided to start a new task that aims at rooting out polio. She said,
If we don’t meet this virus with an immediate surge of commitment, the virus may win. We are facing our best and perhaps our last opportunity to eradicate polio.
But eradicating the disease has been a tough job, with the infection rate ticking again after touching a record low of 483 cases in 2001.
Countries worst affected by the disease are India, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nigeria and Africa.
The WHO has postulated that a two-year operation to complete the job of eliminating polio would need some $1.2 billion, which is only twice what has been spent on containing the outbreaks in the 26 newly infected countries.
