The Courier of Montgomery County reports World Polio Day is being celebrated by Rotary International on Saturday, October24th.
A Polio walk is planned on the track at Buddy Moorhead Stadium in Conroe, and will be hosted by the Interact Clubs of Conroe High School and Washington High School in conjunction with the Rotary Club of Conroe.
The walk gets underway at 9 AM and should be over by 11 AM.
Eradicating Polio in the world today needs everyone’s help. One can help by:
Hitting the track and start walking.
Getting sponsors.
Signing up as an event sponsor.
Sending funds to endpolio.org
In 1985 Rotary International began their effort to end Polio. In the 1950’s, Polio was eradicated in the United States through the use of the Salk Vaccine. It eventually became an oral serum. From one country to another, polio has become nonexistent until now when there are only two countries with new Polio cases. Dropping to less than 40 today, Polio had around 350,000 cases in 1985. The two countries which have Polio today are Afghanistan and Pakistan. These two countries have no wastewater systems in rural areas.
Being a water-borne disease, when it rains, the disease mostly gets transmitted to kids. On an ongoing basis, oral doses of serum are given to infants for protection from the virus. Following a dose of serum to an infant, the baby’s “pinkie” is dipped into permanent purple ink. The purple ink is no longer there at the age of five or six, but the young kid is assumed to have been immunized.
Tens of millions of doses of Polio sera each year are given to infants across the globe. The millions of doses of Polio sera will be ongoing for three years, once no new cases are found.
