In a recent update, it came to highlight that Vaccine Derived Polio cases have been reported in mega countries i.e. the US, UK and Israel.
The world has battled polio for a long time. In 1970, it caused havoc across the world. At that time,it had become a major crisis across the globe. Till now, 125 countries have become polio-free in recent years, but now it is emerging in parts of the world that haven’t had cases in decades.
What is Polio?Â
Polio is also called poliomyelitis. It is a contaminated disease caused by the virus called “Polio Virus”. The common symptoms of the disease are fever, headache, and fainting. The disease has its symptoms more like the flu.
This virus has life-threatening consequences. The polio virus attacks the nervous system of the human body and it disables or paralyses the person’s body. There is no medical cure for this virus. As such, if a person gets infected, then the person will end up having disabilities.
The polio vaccine is the only effective tool against this virus. The vaccine itself contains a weakened polio virus. The vaccine aims to introduce the weakened virus into the body so that the innate immune system of the human body will recognise the virus and kill it by itself and that’s how the human immune system becomes strong enough to fight against any kind of infection similar to the polio virus.
Global Polio Eradication Initiative.
In 1988, the Global Polio Eradication Initiative was launched to eradicate polio from all over the world. At that time, it was necessary to launch such an initiative because 125 countries were suffering from a huge crisis of polio.
According to the Global Polio Eradication Initiative report, in 2020 the world health organisation certified the African region as free of wild polio. With the GPEI, the world has made collective efforts to eradicate it across the globe. Now, many countries are declared polio-free, despite Afghanistan and Pakistan. These countries still have cases of wild polio.
What about recent cases ?
Recently, Polio has been emerging in parts of the world that haven’t had cases in decades. This year cases have started being recognized in countries such as the US, the UK and Israel.
In Israel, the first case of polio was detected in Jerusalem. There has been no single case reported since 1989.
The Health Department of New York City reported the first case in decades.
In all these cases, the virus detected is not the Wild Poliovirus. This type of polio is derived from a vaccine, so it is called the Vaccine Derived Polio Virus.
The vaccine derived from the polio virus is not the naturally occurring form of polio. The vaccine derived from polio has a link with the oral polio vaccine (OPV) which is used in its eradication. The vaccine contains a weakened polio virus which induces immunity.
In recent cases, it has appeared that this weakened virus remained as it is in the body of a child who has poor immunity, and it spread through contamination.
However, in areas with very low immunization coverage, the weakened virus can circulate for extended periods and eventually start to regain virulence and lead to a form of the virus that can cause illness and paralysis.
Due to these recent detections, Israel, the UK, and the U.S. now join a list of about 30 countries that are affected by this type of polio. The only way to stop both wild and vaccine-derived poliovirus is to make sure that children everywhere are vaccinated.
Read more: Polio traces found in sewage in London
Also read: Sewage waters of Kolkata show signs of Poliovirus derived from Vaccines.
