Africa is wild polio free

Hanna Helder studied German language and literature at the Albert Ludwig University in Freiburg. In addition to her studies, she has gained a lot of experience in radio and print journalism through internships and freelance work. She has been at the Burda School of Journalism since October 2018 and writes, among other things, as a trainee for

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The wild poliovirus has been defeated in Africa. This announcement is a great success, especially in times of Corona. But the danger of polio has not yet been averted worldwide.

After decades, the battle in Africa has been won: the independent Africa Regional Certification Commission (ARCC) declared on Tuesday that the wild-type poliovirus had been eradicated in all 47 countries in the Africa region of the World Health Organization (WHO). "Today is a historic day for Africa," said Commissioner Rose Leke. According to the WHO, this is only the second virus to be eradicated on the continent after smallpox around 40 years ago.

Big threat to children

Poliomyelitis, or polio for short, has been an extremely serious threat to children around the world for decades. The disease attacks the nervous system and can lead to paralysis within hours, which is why the disease is also known as polio. Small children under the age of five are particularly affected. Find out more about the virus, the disease and the vaccination here.

Extinction under severe conditions

In 1988 the global community set itself the goal of eradicating the disease. But the challenges in Africa were enormous: Conflicts, poor infrastructure, refugees and distrust of vaccinations made the work of the helpers difficult.

In 1996, the wild poliovirus paralyzed more than 75,000 children in Africa, according to the WHO. Every country on the continent was affected. It was only when South Africa's President Nelson Mandela started a campaign that same year that the disease was fought harder in Africa. Millions of vaccinations have been given. According to the WHO, this prevented around 1.8 million cases of polio paralysis.

"The fight is not over yet."

However, WHO Africa director Matshidiso Moeti said: "The fight is not over yet." A rare vaccine-derived form of polio still exists on the continent - and two countries in the world are still fighting the wild polio virus : Afghanistan and Pakistan.

"We have made significant strides in combating the disease, but unfortunately we have not been able to achieve polio eradication in the country," said Polio Eradication Initiative coordinator in Pakistan, Rana Safdar. So far this year, 67 cases of wild-type polio have been confirmed in the country, and 37 in Afghanistan. "There is still a difficult road ahead of us to eradicate the wild-type polio virus in Afghanistan and Pakistan," said WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

Until then, there is still a risk in Africa that wild polio will return as a result of an imported case. "As long as there's polio somewhere, it's a threat anywhere," Tedros said. As a result, children continue to be vaccinated and the disease is pursued. (hh / dpa)

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