Nigeria, others to benefit from $450m fund to fight polio

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Rotary Club have announced a commitment of up to $450 million to support the eradication of polio in countries they are endemic, including Nigeria.
The announcement was delivered to an audience of nearly 40,000 Rotary members attending the humanitarian organisations’ annual convention in Atlanta, USA, yesterday.
“In 2016, fewer children were paralysed by polio than ever before, thanks to the dedication of Rotary members and our partners,” said John Germ, president of the Rotary Club.
Germ further said, “The paralysis of even one child by a preventable disease is unacceptable, and I’m proud to see our members redoubling their commitment to ensure we reach every single child with the polio vaccine.”
Rotary and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation are renewing their longstanding support for ending polio – a paralysing, life-altering scourge on the verge of becoming the second human disease ever to be eliminated.
Rotary committed to raise $50 million per year over the next three years, with every dollar to be matched with two additional dollars from the Gates Foundation.
“This expanded agreement will translate into $450 million for polio eradication activities, including immunization and surveillance over the next three years. This critical funding helps ensure countries around the world remain polio-free,” according to a release from Rotary International.
While polio paralysed over 350,000 children year in more than 125 countries around the world 30 years ago, the disease has been contained in all but three countries of Afghanistan, Nigeria and Pakistan. The United Nations Children Emergency Fund (UNICEF) says there have been only five cases in 2017.
After Nigeria recorded four cases of polio last year, Isaac Adewole, minister of health, at the 70th World Health Assembly in Geneva, told world leaders that in curtailing the spread of Wild Polio Virus (WPV1), across Nigeria’s borders, there had been robust international outbreak response and enhanced surveillance activities.
“The surveillance activities include high level coordination with countries of the Lake Chad region, implementation of high quality rounds of vaccination of high risk populations during in-between rounds activities,” said Adewole.
Anne Schuchat, acting director of the US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, said “today’s funding helps address a $1.5 billion funding need that will help ensure that the virus is eliminated from these remaining countries and prevented from regaining a foothold anywhere else in the world.”
Also, Anthony Lake, UNICEF executive director, added that today’s funding commitments would enable the programme continue to improve performance and overcome challenges to reach every child, including vaccinating children in conflict areas.
“We are, together, truly on the verge of eradicating polio from the planet but only if we work relentlessly to reach the children we have not yet reached,”
Bill Gates, co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and John Germ, president of Rotary International, also announced an extension of their partnership in front of more than 20,000 Rotarians.
Up to $150 million in funds raised by Rotary members over the next three years will be matched 2:1 by the Gates Foundation, resulting in up to $450 million in the next three years for the GPEI. The Gates Foundation pledged a total of $450 million, including this matching agreement.

Anthonia Obokoh