We continue to see cases of polio in Pakistan
Rotarians:
We continue to see cases of polio in Pakistan, with an additional 5 in the past week bringing us to a yearly total of 71. Needless to say this is troubling. You’ll see from the notes below that the Technical Advisory Group on Polio Eradication has been paying particular attention to programmatic changes and modifications to better address the situation. Pakistan is taking steps to enhance their vaccination efforts in the face of resistence, and in the last week of July through the first week of August, over 3.25 million children were immunized. Our role in this fight to raise funds and awareness continues until we’ve eradicated the last case in Pakistan.
Elsewhere, while there are no wild polio virus cases, continued monitoring and responses to occasional circulating vaccine-derived cases are continuing. The quicker we can get to total eradication, the quicker we will see these cases disappear, too.
While we’re still cautiously optimistic that Nigeria will soon be certified polio free, much continued diligence is being undertaken there. This will be a major milestone for our efforts. If we can accomplish this in India and Nigeria, we know that Pakistan and Afghanistan can’t be far behind.
If your clubs or districts haven’t yet set polio plus goals, now is the time to get them on the books. Remember that Rotary is asking that each club commit to $1,500 for the eradication of polio. Not all clubs will be able to reach that amount, but I know that in our zones, many, many clubs will well exceed that amount. In addition, all DDF contributions will be matched 1:1 by the World Fund, and 2:1 by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The Rotary Foundation would like to see all districts contribute 20% of their available DDF to this fight…resulting in millions of dollars to eradicate polio. Let me know if I can provide additional information to you.
For those of you going to the Denver Zone Institute next week, I look forward to seeing you!
--Ken