Polio virus spreading at alarming rate - health experts

Five times as many West and Central African children have been struck with polio in the first half of 2004 compared to the same period last year, health experts said on Tuesday. They warned that the threat of the biggest epidemic in recent years looms over the region unless massive immunisation programmes swing into action. "West and Central Africa is on the brink of the largest polio epidemic in recent years," the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, which is battling to wipe out the crippling disease by 2005, said in a statement. "A major epidemic this autumn would leave thousands of African children paralysed for life." The Initiative said the epicentre of the outbreak remained the northern Nigerian state of Kano, where immunisations were suspended last September over concerns about vaccine safety. A further blow to eradication efforts came on Tuesday, with confirmation that polio had re-emerged after a three-year absence in Sudan. The virus identified in the western Darfur region had close genetic links to the polio endemic in northern Nigeria. "There is no question that the virus is spreading at an alarming pace," said David Heymann, the World Health Organisation's representative for the project. "The fact that the Sudan is now re-infected is concrete evidence of the need to support a massive immunisation response right across West and Central Africa," he added. Polio can strike at any age, though half of all cases occur in children under three years. The disease causes paralysis, usually in the lower limbs, leaving victims consigned to a wheelchair or on crutches. WHO statistics show 299 cases of polio in West and Central Africa so far this year, compared with just 58 in the same period in 2003. Furthermore, the virus has hit children in 10 African countries that were previously declared polio-free. The Initiative said massive, synchronised immunisation campaigns already planned for October and November - the so-called polio 'high season' - were crucial if the threat was to be averted. Polio spreads more rapidly in the rainy season as transmission is aided with the presence of surface water. Health experts are aiming to reach 74 million children across 22 African countries before then end of November and say grass-roots support is vital in getting children to participate. "The first priority should be to increase community participation in polio activities throughout the region. Many families still need re-assurance, in the wake of rumours spreading out of northern Nigeria, about the safety of the polio vaccine," said Carol Bellamy, head of the United Nations Children's Fund, UNICEF. In the northern Nigerian state of Kano, some Islamic clerics preached in mosques that polio immunisation was part of a Western plot to reduce the Muslim population as the vaccines could cause cancer and infertility. Last month Kano state authorities said they had found “safe polio vaccines” in Indonesia and would resume immunisations as soon as the imported vaccines arrived in the state. WHO's Heymann told IRIN by phone from Geneva that he had been in touch with the Kano authorities on Tuesday and there was still no official date for immunisations to restart. "I spoke to the governor about two hours ago and he told me the vaccines are in place and they are looking over the final details this week."