This Day in History: India’s last case of polio was in 2011
Three years ago today, Jan. 13, 2011, a 2-year-old girl in the West Bengal state fell ill of the crippling disease polio. That was the last case of polio in India.
Now after three year without a polio case, the World Health Organization (WHO) can officially declare India polio-free.
Public domain photo/Robin klein
Calling this a major milestone is putting it mildly. This is an unprecedented achievement for India, which not long ago was considered the epicenter for polio. In fact, the Global Polio Eradication Initiative said this week, “India was once thought to be the most difficult country in which to achieve polio eradication.”
In fact, until 2009, India accounted for more than half the world’s polio incidence.
Speaking about this important milestone for the country, WHO Representative to India, Dr Nata Menabde, said, “This landmark is a great credit to the strong commitment and leadership of the Government of India.”
“Credit also goes to the government’s strong partnership with WHO, Rotary and UNICEF as also the millions of frontline workers – the vaccinators, social mobilizers and community and health workers – who continue to implement innovative strategies to rid India of polio,” she added.
The entire South-East Asia Region of the World Health Organization is today at the brink of an historic occasion—polio-free certification at the end of March 2014.
The certification process
Certification of polio eradication is conducted on a regional basis. Each WHO region can consider certification only when all countries in the area demonstrate the absence of wild poliovirus transmission for at least three consecutive years in the presence of certification standard surveillance. In addition, all facilities holding wild poliovirus infectious and potentially infectious materials must have implemented bio-containment measures according to the global action plan for laboratory containment of wild poliovirus
The South-East Asia Regional Certification Commission is scheduled to meet in New Delhi in the last week of March 2014. If the Commission is convinced that there is no wild poliovirus in the region and the surveillance quality is good enough to pick up any wild poliovirus and phase 1 laboratory containment work has been completed, it will certify the South-East Asia Region of WHO as polio-free.
The South-East Asia Region of WHO region has 11 member states – India, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Indonesia, Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Timor-Leste.
