Polio Facts

What is Rotary?

• Rotary International is a volunteer organization with 33,000 clubs in more than 200 countries and geographic areas. Rotary initiates humanitarian projects that address challenges affecting the world today, such as hunger, poverty and illiteracy.
  Rotary has 1.2 million members worldwide.
• District 6150 of Rotary International comprises 39 Rotary Clubs with approximately 2,400 Rotarians located in central and eastern Arkansas.
• Rotary’s flagship program is its effort to protect children against polio. It aims to eradicate the disease from the world.

What is polio?

• A crippling and potentially fatal infectious disease, polio (poliomyelitis) still strikes children, mainly under the age of 5, in countries in Asia, Africa and the Middle East.
• Polio can cause paralysis and sometimes death. Because there is no cure for polio, the best protection is prevention. For as little as 60 cents worth of vaccine, a child can be protected against this crippling disease for life.
• It can cause paralysis within hours, and polio paralysis is almost always irreversible. 
• In the most severe cases, polio attacks the motor neurons of the brain stem, causing breathing difficulty or even death.
• Historically, polio has been the world’s greatest cause of disability.
• If polio isn’t eradicated, the world will continue to live under the threat of the disease. More than 10 million children will be paralyzed in the next 40 years if the world fails to capitalize on its $5 billion global investment in eradication.

What is PolioPlus?

• In 1985, Rotary International initiated PolioPlus – a program to immunize all the world’s children against polio. To date, Rotary has contributed nearly $800 million and countless volunteer hours to the protection of more than 2 billion children in 122 countries.

What is the Global Polio Eradication Initiative?

• Spearheaded in 1988 by the World Health Organization, Rotary International, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and UNICEF, this initiative has reduced the incidence of polio by more than 99 percent. In 1988, more than 125 countries were polio-endemic, and more than 350,000 children were paralyzed by the disease each year.
• Since 1988, more than 2 billion children have received the oral polio vaccine.
• In January 2009, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation awarded $355 million to the effort. Rotary, in turn, pledged $200 million in matching funds for a total of $555 million to directly support immunization campaigns in endemic countries. Rotary has termed this effort “Rotary’s $200 Million Challenge.”

What are some current polio statistics?

• Endemic, wild poliovirus has been eliminated from all but four countries in the world (Afghanistan, India, Nigeria and Pakistan).
• Reported polio cases have dropped 99.8 percent, from 350,000 in 1988 to fewer than 2,000 in 2008.
• In 2008, only 1,633 cases of polio were reported: 31 in Afghanistan, 552 in India, 790 in Nigeria, 118 in Pakistan and 142 in nonendemic countries.

What is the legacy of polio eradication?

• The savings of polio eradication are potentially as high as $1.5 billion per year – funds that could be used to address other public health priorities. The savings in human suffering will be immeasurable.

What is the End Polio Now event?

• A Rotary District 6150 dinner is planned for May 5, 2009, at 6 p.m. to raise awareness and financial support for “Rotary’s $200 Million Challenge” as Rotary works to raise $200 million to match a total of $355 million in challange grants from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to erradicate polio.
• Special guests include Arkansas Governor Mike Beebe, Rotary Foundation Trustee John Germ and members of Central Arkansas Polio Survivors.
• The event will be held at Embassy Suites Little Rock, 11301 Financial Centre Parkway.
• Tickets are $50 per person, tables of 10 may be purchased for $500.
• For more information about tickets or event sponsorship, please contact Paulette McConnell at 501-908-5455 or paulette.mcconnell@acxiom.com.
• On the web - www.Rotary6150.org/polio