Polio News and Research

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Poliomyelitis (polio) is a highly infectious disease caused by a virus that invades the nervous system and can cause severe paralysis. The virus enters the body through the mouth and multiplies in the intestine. Initial symptoms are fever, fatigue, headache, vomiting, stiffness in the neck, and pain in the limbs. One in 200 infections leads to irreversible paralysis (usually in the legs). Among those paralyzed, 5-10% die when their breathing muscles become immobilized. Polio mainly affects children under five years of age. Naturally occurring polio was eliminated in the U.S. in 1979 and in the Western Hemisphere by 1991; however, worldwide efforts are continuing towards eradication of this contagious and devastating disease.

Working toward polio eradication in 2018

"Since the eradication of smallpox in the late 1970s, no other diseases have followed suit; the goal that has come closest so far is eradication of polio," a Lancet Infectious Diseases editorial states, noting that in 2012 only about 250 people were infected with polio worldwide.

20 Feb 2013

Scientists create new strain of polio to protect vaccine factory workers

"Scientists have created new strains of polio intended to protect workers in factories that make polio vaccine," the New York Times reports.

20 Feb 2013

New issue of Global Health Diplomacy Network's 'Health Diplomacy Monitor' available online

Volume 4, Issue 1 of the Global Health Diplomacy Network's "Health Diplomacy Monitor" is now available online.

20 Feb 2013

Vaccine prices and availability: an interview with Kate Elder, Vaccines Policy Advisor for Médecins Sans Frontières's Access Campaign

One of the key reasons why children are missed by immunization programs, particularly in developing countries where Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) works, is that the products that we currently have in their present formulation are not well-suited to the places that have the most un-immunized children. These are the most challenging contexts to work in.

19 Feb 2013

New lab at Diamond to help scientists delve into inner workings of pathogens

The UK's national synchrotron facility, Diamond Light Source, is now the first and only place in Europe where pathogens requiring Containment Level 3 - including serious viruses such as those responsible for AIDS, Hepatitis and some types of flu - can be analysed at atomic and molecular level using synchrotron light.

18 Feb 2013

Opinion pieces address violence against women

Several opinion pieces have been published in recognition of One Billion Rising, a global campaign calling for an end to violence against women and gender equality.

15 Feb 2013

More polio workers killed than reported cases of disease, NPR reports

"The global effort to eradicate polio has reached a bizarre stage: More people have been gunned down recently over the disease than actually infected with it," NPR's "Shots" blog reports.

14 Feb 2013

Blogs examine root causes, implications of myths about polio vaccination

Citing a review by Telegraph correspondent Rob Crilly criticizing the film Zero Dark Thirty "for getting its facts wrong about the CIA vaccination campaign that sought to confirm the DNA of Osama bin Laden's children," development blogger Tom Murphy writes in the Humanosphere blog, "Crilly's larger point is to say that the film gives further ammo to polio vaccine conspiracy theorists."

14 Feb 2013

Learning from India's success in eradicating polio

In a post in the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's "Impatient Optimists" blog, Shelley Thakral, senior communications officer for the foundation's India Country Office, interviews Orin Levine, director of vaccine delivery at the foundation, about his recent trip to India "to observe the experience of Bihar, a state in Northern India, where the polio effort is now being leveraged to strengthen routine immunization in ways that are really exciting."

13 Feb 2013

U.N. Secretary General condemns violence against health workers in Nigeria

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Monday "strongly condemned the killing in north-eastern Nigeria of three doctors from the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, calling the attack and other recent incidents of violence against health workers 'unacceptable,'" the U.N. News Centre reports.

13 Feb 2013

Bill Gates answers questions on global health, other issues in Reddit 'ask me anything' discussion

"Former chief executive and current chairman of Microsoft and co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Bill Gates did a Reddit AMA (ask me anything) Monday and discussed several important global health issues," the Global Dispatch reports.

13 Feb 2013

Study: 17P not effective in preventing preterm birth among women with twin pregnancies

In a study to be presented on February 14 between 8 a.m. and 10 a.m. PST, at the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine's 33rd annual meeting, The Pregnancy Meeting -, researchers will report findings that suggest that 17P, a form of progesterone, is not effective in preventing preterm birth among women with twin pregnancies - and may possibly be harmful.

13 Feb 2013

Disease eradication efforts set sights on polio, Guinea worm

"It's not a race, exactly, but there's an intriguing uncertainty about whether a former U.S. president or a software magnate will cause the next deliberate extinction of a species in the wild. Will Jimmy Carter eradicate Guinea worm before Bill Gates eradicates polio?" Wall Street Journal commentator Matt Ridley asks in his "Mind & Matter" column.

13 Feb 2013

Moving beyond condemnation to actions that protect health workers

"Between December and January, at least 16 polio workers were killed in Pakistan, according to Reuters -- and on Friday, nine female health workers were slain in northern Nigeria, also while working on a polio eradication campaign," Laura Hoemeke, director of communications and knowledge management at IntraHealth, writes in the organization's "Global Health Blog."

12 Feb 2013

Three North Korean doctors killed in Nigeria; Government, U.N. agencies condemn murders of polio workers

"Three North Korean doctors have been killed in a pre-dawn attack in Nigeria's northeastern town of Potiskum, police say," but "[t]he motive of Sunday's attack was not immediately clear," Al Jazeera reports.

12 Feb 2013

Nine polio workers killed in northern Nigeria

"Nine female polio vaccinators have been killed in two shootings at health centers in northern Nigeria, police have told the BBC," the news agency reports. "In the first attack in Kano the polio vaccinators were shot dead by gunmen who drove up on a motor tricycle," and "[t]hirty minutes later gunmen targeted a clinic outside Kano city as the vaccinators prepared to start work," BBC News writes.

11 Feb 2013

Viewpoints: 'Empty budget gestures'; GOP should endorse 'doomsday' sequester; 'Imagined dangers' imperil vaccine successes

President Obama on Tuesday called on Congress to put off -- again -- the start of the "sequester," a series of across-the-board spending cuts that would save $1.2 billion over 10 years.

9 Feb 2013

U.S. should issue formal ban on using vaccination campaigns as cover for intelligence operations

In an opinion piece in Bloomberg Businessweek's "Small World" blog, Charles Kenny, a fellow at the Center for Global Development and the New America Foundation, examines the effects of "a fake polio vaccination drive organized by the CIA in an effort to collect DNA from [Osama] bin Laden's family" on polio immunization efforts in Pakistan.

5 Feb 2013

India's success in fighting polio shows what country is capable of with proper funding, accountability

"India's successful war on polio shows what can happen when its government sets clear policy goals backed with proper funding and real accountability," journalist and author Dan Morrison writes in an opinion piece in the New York Times' "Latitude" blog.

5 Feb 2013

Reduced dose of polio vaccine feasible in low-income areas

Vaccinating infants with a single fractional dose of inactivated poliovirus is an effective and more affordable alternative to using multiple full doses, report researchers in the New England Journal of Medicine.

4 Feb 2013

Polio News and Research

Further Reading

Working toward polio eradication in 2018

Scientists create new strain of polio to protect vaccine factory workers

New issue of Global Health Diplomacy Network's 'Health Diplomacy Monitor' available online

Vaccine prices and availability: an interview with Kate Elder, Vaccines Policy Advisor for Médecins Sans Frontières's Access Campaign

New lab at Diamond to help scientists delve into inner workings of pathogens

Opinion pieces address violence against women

More polio workers killed than reported cases of disease, NPR reports

Blogs examine root causes, implications of myths about polio vaccination

Learning from India's success in eradicating polio

U.N. Secretary General condemns violence against health workers in Nigeria

Bill Gates answers questions on global health, other issues in Reddit 'ask me anything' discussion

Study: 17P not effective in preventing preterm birth among women with twin pregnancies

Disease eradication efforts set sights on polio, Guinea worm

Moving beyond condemnation to actions that protect health workers

Three North Korean doctors killed in Nigeria; Government, U.N. agencies condemn murders of polio workers

Nine polio workers killed in northern Nigeria

Viewpoints: 'Empty budget gestures'; GOP should endorse 'doomsday' sequester; 'Imagined dangers' imperil vaccine successes

U.S. should issue formal ban on using vaccination campaigns as cover for intelligence operations

India's success in fighting polio shows what country is capable of with proper funding, accountability

Reduced dose of polio vaccine feasible in low-income areas

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