Fred Ezeh, Abuja
Barring any change in plans, the World Health Organization (WHO) will, on Tuesday, present a certificate of polio-free country to Nigeria, marking the successful defeat of polio in Nigeria.
The certificate will be presented by a delegation from WHO to President Muhammadu Buhari, in a virtual event scheduled to hold at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
The presentation of the certificate followed the recent declaration of Nigeria, a polio-free country by WHO few months ago. It’s also an indication that Nigeria has spent the past three years without a record of polio in any part of the country.
On June 18th, 2020, WHO certified Nigeria a polio free country, after three consecutive years of no record of outbreak. The process of certification which commenced few months ago culminated in the complete documentation by the officials of the National Primary Healthcare Development Agency (NPHCDA), and was accepted by the World Health Organization team.
WHO Nigeria Country office, had in a tweet, confirmed that Nigeria’s complete documentation for wild polio virus free status was accepted by the Africa Regional Certification Commission for polio eradication (ARCC).
Chairman, Nigeria National Polioplus, Dr. Tunji Funsho, in a reaction to the development congratulated Nigerians and the Federal Government for the feat.
He described it as a great achievement for Nigerian, but insisted that the fight is not over yet, as more efforts are required to ensure that more people have access to vaccination which will permanently put an end to polio in Nigeria.
He commended the efforts of the local and international partners, particularly the National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA), Bill and Melinda Gate, UNICEF, WHO and several others for their financial and logistics contributions to the success of the programme.
He said: “On our part, the Rotary International, through the ‘End Polio Now’ campaign, we contributed $298 million in past 15 years to the fight against polio in Nigeria. Globally, $2.2 billion was spent in the fight and we are happy significant success are being achieved.
“With exit of Nigeria from the league of countries with polio, Afghanistan and Pakistan are the only two countries in the world that are yet to stop the transmission of the wild polio. 72 polio cases were confirmed worldwide in 2016, indicating a reduction of more than 99.9 percent since 1980s, when the world recorded about 1,000 cases per day.”
He stressed the importance of engagements of traditional rulers, religious leaders and other people that command loyalty and respect at community levels to ensure that new born babies are properly immunized against polio and other vaccine preventable diseases.