Editorial: World Health Day 1995: target 2000 - a world without polio

World Health • 48th Year, No. l, Jonuory-february 1995 3 Editorial World Health Day 1995 Target 2000 - A world without polio Hiroshi Nakajima The world now stands on the brink of global eradication of poliomyelitis. Since Jonas Salk in 1955, followed by Albert Sabin in 1961, produced and demonstrated the effectiveness of their vaccines against polio, and especially since WHO and UNICEF's Expanded Programme on Immunization brought potent, well-stored, safely administered polio vaccines to over 80% of the world's children, polio has been in retreat. In 1988, the World Health Assembly targeted global polio eradication for the year 2000, a fitting gift from health workers of this century to the children of the next. On 29 September 1994, an International Commission headed by Dr Frederick Robbins was able to declare that the disease had been eradicated throughout the Region of the Americas, just ten years after the Directing Council of the Pan American Health Organization committed its Member States to the eradication target. All regions of the world are now making steady progress towards that goal. The whole area of the Western Pacific is about to become the second polio-free region in the world. On World Health Day- 7 April 1995 - it is anticipated that at least 15 countries in Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean will provide polio vaccine to their children simultaneously. Dr Hiroshi Nako;;ma, Director-General of the World Health Organization. The key to success is the application of certain simple and highly effective strategies. National immunization days, during which vaccine is given within a day or two to all chi ldren under five, supplement routine immunizations. Systems of surveillance, which include testing faecal samples for the poliovirus, identify and investigate all cases of flaccid paralysis in children. As fewer and fewer cases occur, wide- spread house to house immunization finally reduces transmission to zero, thus leading to eradication. Many partners are working towards this common goal. While almost 80% of resources needed for success will come from the endemic countries themselves, many agencies and institutions besides WHO, notably Rotary International, UNICEF, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the International Development Banks, as well as the governments of Canada, Japan and the United States, are cooperating to ensure that critical needs for advocacy, support and vaccine are being met. Before we can sit back and enjoy the benefits of polio eradication, however, the job has to be completed. There is a need for national immunization days to be organized, for sustainable supplies of good quality vaccine to be stocked and delivered, for personnel to be trained, and for epidemiological survei llance to be established. But the task is not confined exclusively to public health services. Only by joining forces with governmental and nongovernmental organizations, United Nations agencies, and the public at large can the target be met on time. Everyone involved in the polio eradication initiative should be proud of the fact that his or her local efforts are making possible the realization of the global goal. TARGET 2000 can only be achieved by ensuring that village after village, district after district, country after country is polio-free. The eradication of polio is within our grasp. We owe it to future generations not to let it slip away. • Hiroshi Noka;ima, M.D. , Ph.D.