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| Africa: Subsaharan | |
| Nigeria Region Will Resume Polio Vaccines | |
| 2004-07-01 | |
| A northern Nigerian region that banned polio vaccinations last year citing safety concerns will resume them in the next few days, the World Health Organization said Wednesday amid heightened fears about the international spread of the crippling disease. Ibrahim Shekarau, governor of the mostly Muslim Nigerian state of Kano, accepted in May that the oral polio vaccine is safe and effective, said Dr. David Heymann, who is overseeing WHO's effort to eradicate the disease. The state is now receiving WHO assistance and is preparing to resume vaccinations in the next few days, Heymann said. Shekarau halted the vaccinations in September 2003 after The U.N. health agency warned last week that Africa is on the brink of the biggest polio epidemic in years, with the disease hitting Nigeria hard and re-emerging in Sudan's war-ravaged Darfur region. "Kano state in Nigeria is now the only polio-endemic area where immunization is not taking place," Heymann said. He said the country has enough vaccine but faces an increased urgency to distribute it since the rainy season is about the begin, which would improve conditions for the disease to spread. Nigeria has reported 259 polio cases this year, compared with 56 in the same period in 2003. The total number of polio cases globally has reached 339 so far this year, almost double the number for the same period last year.
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| Posted by:Steve White |
| #6 when are we gonna get serious and spread some mullah-cide on these assholes? one shot, one kill |
| Posted by: Frank G 2004-07-01 10:51:45 AM |
| #5 Desert Blondie- Don't fall for that "we owe the Muslims, because they preserved the knowledge of the West during the Dark Ages" crap It was the Byzantine Empire (i.e., the eastern Roman Empire) that did the preserving, not the Muslims (who in fact got their knowledge from the Byzantines). |
| Posted by: Spot 2004-07-01 10:30:11 AM |
| #4 Countries across the continent are increasingly scared to death concerned about the rate at which the disease is spreading internationally from northern Nigeria since immunization was suspended in September 2003. Ten previously polio-free countries have now been reinfected. And a big "thank you" to our northern Nigerian mullahs. Couldn't have done this without them. Barbara, I'm rather fond of any deserving parties experiencing the fast onset type of lead poisoning. I'm confident that we're in violent agreement over this. From UPI Commentary: Al-Qaida's agenda for Iraq: What Al-Ayyeri sees now is a "clean battlefield" in which Islam faces a new form of unbelief. This, he labels "secularist democracy." This threat is "far more dangerous to Islam" than all its predecessors combined. The reasons, he explains in a whole chapter, must be sought in democracy's "seductive capacities." This form of "unbelief" persuades the people that they are in charge of their destiny and that, using their collective reasoning, they can shape policies and pass laws as they see fit. That leads them into ignoring the "unalterable laws" promulgated by God for the whole of mankind, and codified in the Islamic shariah (jurisprudence) until the end of time. The goal of democracy, according to Al-Ayyeri, is to "make Muslims love this world, forget the next world and abandon jihad." If established in any Muslim country for a reasonably long time, democracy could lead to economic prosperity, which, in turn, would make Muslims "reluctant to die in martyrdom" in defense of their faith. Remember folks, disease and pestilence are the terrorists' friend. It's what the Islamists want. Keep citizens in abject poverty long enough and even people's very lives become commodities. Technological retrogression alone is a form of human genocide, it could only be outshone by theocracy's ability to slaughter en mass. The "Jonestown" sort of Kool-Aid Kwotient™ shown in this polio epidemic represents a new |
| Posted by: Zenster 2004-07-01 4:35:12 AM |
| #3 I'm starting to seriously doubt all this "we owe the Muslims, because they preserved the knowledge of the West during the Dark Ages" crap, when there's this kind of idiocy bubbling up from all corners of the Islamic world. |
| Posted by: Desert Blondie 2004-07-01 2:46:55 AM |
| #2 I have to disagree, Steve - I doubt this kind of blind stupidity is preventable. Except perhaps with a case of lead poisoning in the right places. ;-) |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2004-07-01 1:44:34 AM |
| #1 Ten previously polio-free countries have now been reinfected. Thanks for nothing, you ignorant Islamic mullah retards. |
| Posted by: Bomb-a-rama 2004-07-01 1:44:10 AM |