Polio eradication is the biggest public health initiative the world has ever seen and it was started in 1985 when Rotary announced that the eradication of polio would be its top priority. A huge challenge . At the time polio paralysed or killed over 350,000 people every year. Since then we have managed to reduce the cases by 99.9%.
There are three types of wild poliovirus but we have eradicated two of them. Only two countries Pakistan and Afghanistan remain endemic.
Nobody ever disputed that the final stages would be the hardest and most expensive but the last year has been particularly rocky. However, we must not let that affect our resolve.
There are new strategies in place to deal with issues like the emerging vaccine hesitancy. This is where rumours create refusals. And in Pakistan, these refusals have increased from 40,000 to 120,000. This exposes more people vaccine-related polio. The new polio vaccines are being developed to prevent this. While the programme has been set back a couple of years, we will see the end of this devastating disease.
When we do eradicate polio, the world will save US$14 billion cumulative by 2050. That is in addition to the US$27 billion we have already saved in health costs since 1988. It will become the second major disease to be eliminated from the face of the earth.
Rotary is committed to raising $50 million a year over the next three years, and each dollar will be matched with an additional two dollars by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
We made a promise to rid the world of polio and as Rotarians, we must follow through.