Fighting polio and the burden of tackling fear

It may no longer be news that many average persons in the regions where the polio virus is  endemic, namely Northern Nigeria (even though there have not been any reported case in the country within the last one year), Pakistan and Afghanistan, often say  the polio vaccine is aimed at depopulating Muslims. Sincerely speaking, damage […]

It may no longer be news that many average persons in the regions where the polio virus is  endemic, namely Northern Nigeria (even though there have not been any reported case in the country within the last one year), Pakistan and Afghanistan, often say  the polio vaccine is aimed at depopulating Muslims.
Sincerely speaking, damage was done almost a decade ago when it was alleged that a family planning hormone was found in the vials of the vaccines used to control poliomyelitis. Whether it was a deliberate additive or an accidental one, these individuals know, and still give this reason for rejecting the vaccine, and so it is not from ‘lack of awareness’.
 It is interesting to know that these same populations do not object to other free medical supplies that have not been shrouded in controversy even if they are from the West. Good examples are the Highly Active Anti-Retroviral Therapy (HAART) and DOTS-TB drugs from the likes of United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and some malaria treatment drugs.
The deadline for the eradication of poliomyelitis from the face of the earth by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and other agencies through the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, GPEI, has since passed, largely due to the refusal of many parents in these three countries to bring out their children for vaccination, and to a lesser extent due to internal strife. A new deadline of 2018 has been set.
The WHO maintains that there has been a 99% reduction in incidence of polio globally. Although it is a tremendous and laudable achievement, this 1% infection that has not been contained in these three countries for long is fast moving out of the box. Now the campaign is again threatened by new reports of cases in not only the politically unstable countries of Yemen, Iraq and Syria, but also in the relatively peaceful Equatorial Guinea, Kenya and Ethiopia, even though onward transmission has been checked in the latter group of countries. We should not also forget that the WHO eradicated smallpox and rinderpest.
All global health organisations and optimistic individual health workers would like to be witness to another breakthrough in disease eradiation in the near future.  If there is to be a sudden and dramatic behavioral change in these parts of the world that will make parents to whole-heartedly and without duress and intimidation surrender their children for polio immunisation, this 1% incidence can be quickly halted.
Instead of giving excuses that the communities are hard-to-reach because there is poor infrastructure or there is low level of awareness, the global health organisations should focus on the real problem – paranoia. These areas are hard to reach mainly because of paranoia not because of poor infrastructure.
There is still and will continue to be suspicion and mistrust for the programme, if the campaign continues to appear to be funded and coordinated from the ‘West’. In many cases as many might have seen, there were outright violent confrontations from these defaulters towards vaccinators entirely due to this real reason. Health workers in the communities know better.
The Islamic Development Bank, IDB, which has donated generously to the fund, has already been brought to the forefront in ensuring that safety standards in the manufacture of these vaccines in Indonesia, another Muslim country, are being duly followed. What it has not been engaged with, at least to the many that are antagonistic to the programme, is in the campaign propaganda.
As Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal enters the ranks of who-is-who in world philanthropy, having already pledged his ‘entire wealth’ to the cause of charity, it will be worthwhile to persuade him as well, to be in the lead in the campaign for polio eradication in these three Muslim countries.
The prince has already donated $30 million to the GPEI fund. The role he can play aside donation of money can be very tactical. He can replace the likes of Bill Gates, who physically tours these regions to administer vaccines to children, or do it together. As long as polio vaccines go to these countries from institutions and notable individuals in the Middle East, rather than from the World Bank, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the 2018 deadline could well be met.
 Muhammad, is a family physician and public health practitioner, and can be reached on  [email protected]