ZCZC
BFF-26
PNG-HEALTH-POLIO-WHO
Polio returns to Papua New Guinea after 18 years: WHO
SYDNEY, June 26, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – An outbreak of polio has been confirmed
in Papua New Guinea, the World Health Organization and the government said,
with the virus detected in a child 18 years after the Pacific nation was
declared free of the disease.
The WHO said there was one confirmed case — a six-year-old boy with lower
limb weakness from Morobe province — with the disease detected in late
April, and paralysis associated with the virus confirmed in May.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the same virus was
also isolated from stool specimens of two healthy children in the same
community, “representing an outbreak”, the WHO added.
“We are deeply concerned about this polio case in Papua New Guinea, and the
fact that the virus is circulating,” PNG’s Health Secretary Pascoe Kase said
in a statement Monday.
“Our immediate priority is to respond and prevent more children from being
infected.”
Steps taken to stop the spread of the highly contagious, crippling disease
include conducting large-scale immunisation campaigns and strengthening
surveillance systems that help detect it early.
PNG has not had a case of the disease since 1996, and was certified as
polio-free in 2000 along with the rest of the WHO’s Western Pacific region.
There is low polio vaccine coverage in Morobe province, on PNG’s northern
coast, with only 61 percent of children receiving the recommended three
doses, the WHO said.
The international body added that inadequate sanitation and hygiene were
also issues in the area.
The WHO said the region’s isolation and the planned immunisation activities
meant the risk of the virus spreading to other countries was low.
Affecting mostly children under the age of five, polio — which has no cure
and can only be prevented by giving a child multiple vaccine doses — can
lead to irreversible paralysis. According to the WHO, the number of polio
cases worldwide has fallen by more than 99 percent since 1988, from an
estimated 350,000 cases then to 22 reported cases in 2017.
Only three countries — Afghanistan, Nigeria and Pakistan — were
considered polio-endemic by the WHO in March.
BSS/AFP/GMR/1122 hrs