CIDA funding to boost anti-polio campaign

The Canadian government, through the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), has donated 20 million Canadian dollars (US $12.6 million) to the World Health Organisation for polio eradication in Nigeria. A WHO official in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, told IRIN on Thursday that the money would be used for polio surveillance, purchasing of vaccine supplies and social mobilisation, among other things. Although the polio situation was improving in Nigeria because of surveillance and immunisation activities, the disease remained a public health problem - especially in the northern states of Kano and Kaduna, which had pockets of wild polio virus, the official said. The CIDA grant was provided to WHO in support of its polio eradication initiative in Nigeria for the years 2002 to 2004, an official from the Canadian High Commission in Abuja told IRIN. The funds are to be used to support the operational costs of planned National Immunisation Days (NIDs), as well as the strengthening of Nigeria's acute flaccid paralysis surveillance and cold chain systems. The overall goal of the Canadian funding is to reduce morbidity (illness) and mortality (death) rates of children in Nigeria, according to the High Commission. "The purpose is to contribute, with other donors, to the eradication of polio in Nigeria and to improve the quality of routine immunisation services in Nigeria," an official told IRIN. The funds are intended to help cover the operational costs of supplementary immunisation days and to strengthen the polio surveillance system - which was critical to the early detection and reporting of disease outbreaks. CIDA's funding will also go towards the renewal of the cold chain system in Nigeria, through the procurement of equipment such as freezers, refrigerators, generators, ice packs, vaccine carriers and thermometers, the Canadian High Commission official added.