[THEATLANTIC] One month after quelling its deadly Ebola outbreak, Nigeria stands poised to make another public-health triumph--the near-eradication of polio.
| Unlike, for example, Pakistain... |
Since 2012, when the World Health Organization declared the crippling infectious disease a 'global-health emergency,' the West African country (the last center of polio on the continent) has overhauled its strategies for combating the scourge. Now, through rigorous vaccination campaigns, Nigeria is on the verge of eliminating the virus and making Africa polio-free, the CDC reported Thursday.
From January to August of this year, Nigeria only reported six cases of polio--a significant drop from the 49 cases it had during that same period in 2013. And when compared with the 122 polio cases from all of 2012, the recent report reveals the rigor of the nation's vaccination efforts. For a four-day period every six to eight weeks, health officials from Nigeria's national polio-eradication program go door-to-door and drop oral immunizations into the mouths of some 10 to 20 million children under the age of five. The campaign especially targets children living in 11 high-risk states located mostly in the northern part of the country. |