Polio – eller børnelammelse – er en smitsom sygdom, som ikke kan kureres, kun forebygges, og som angriber centralnervesystemet. Nu viser den sit grimme ansigt igen.
A four-fold increase in polio has been reported in Nigeria, with the disease spreading to neighbouring Niger, Mali and Ivory Coast, a World Health Organisation official says, according to BBC online Monday.
Forty-three cases were reported in Nigeria this year, compared to 11 last year, the official, Thomas Moran, said.
Curbing the polio virus in Nigeria is key to eradicating (udrydde) the crippling disease in Africa, he said.
In 2003, northern Nigeria’s Muslim leaders leaders opposed vaccinations, claiming they could cause infertility. Nigeria is one of four countries in the world – along with Pakistan, India and Afghanistan – where polio is still a major health risk.
– The success of polio eradication in Africa rests on Nigeria interrupting the virus, he said.
Polio was affecting eight northern Nigerian states – two more than a few months ago, the head of Nigeria’s National Primary Healthcare Development Agency (NPHDA), Dr Ado Muhammad, told the BBC.
Mr Moran said the Nigerian government had shown “strong leadership” in the campaign to eradicate polio and the WHO had been carrying out large scale vaccination programmes to prevent the disease from spreading.
He also stressed that the number of children affected remained low.
– You can call it a four-fold increase but it is still very low transmission in a country as large as Nigeria with almost 50 million children under five, he said.
At the Commonwealth summit last month, the leaders of Nigeria, Canada, the UK and Australia pledged millions of dollars towards the global effort to eradicate polio, BBC notes.
