Today, for World Polio Day, we are joining together to give One Last Push in the battle to end polio for ever.
The worldwide campaign against this terrible disease is now reaching a crucial moment. Last year, the World Health Organisation declared India to be polio-free. In July 2015 it announced that Nigeria is also on course for a polio-free future with no new cases detected for 12 months. Only Pakistan and Afghanistan have reported cases of wild poliovirus this year – and total cases are in steep decline.
It is now a real possibility that we can eradicate polio completely before the next UK general election in 2020. This would make it only the second human disease in history that we have managed to wipe out.
But we can only win this historic victory if the UK government follows up on the fantastic support it has given the Global Polio Eradication Initiative so far. We need our government to keep backing polio efforts until the world is certified polio-free.
Up until the 1980s, polio was still paralysing children here in Britain, and there are still people struggling with the effects of this today. Now there is a real chance to make sure that no child, no matter where they live, has to suffer from this disease.
Today we are calling on people across the UK to contact their MPs and urge them to publicly back Britain’s polio commitment. Let’s make sure that every one of the UK’s 650 members of parliament will stand up for Britain’s pledges on polio and be part of the parliament that ends polio for ever.
Please visit www.onelastpush.org where you can send this message directly to your local MP. You will be backing thousands of volunteer health workers in some of the world’s most inaccessible regions. These are local people who travel on foot, by bicycle, donkey, camel or elephant to help vaccinate every last child.
To every MP, our request is simple. Please keep up the pressure on polio. Please join us in giving One Last Push – and ensure that by 2020 we have wiped out this cruel disease once and for all.
Sir Ken Robinson Author, speaker and international adviser on education
Ted Hill CEO of British Polio Fellowship
Dr Nick Ward Former chairman of TAG, EMRO
Lord Ara Darzi Director, Imperial College London’s Institute of Global Health Innovation
Prof Nick Spencer Emeritus professor of child health, Warwick Medical School, University of Warwick
Sana Shah Outreach coordinator, British Pakistan Foundation
Dr Lola Dare CEO, Chestrad
Suniya Qureshi Fellow at the Muslim Institute
Professor Nick Grassly Epidemiologist at Imperial College London
Aaron Haroon Rashid CEO, Unicorn Black
Dr Gareth William Emeritus professor of medicine and senior research fellow in philosophy, University of Bristol
Dr James Bunn Consultant paediatrician, Alder Hey Children’s NHS Foundation Trust
Dr Aminu Shittu University of Liverpool, PhD candidate, Epidemiology and Population Health, Institute of Infection and Global Health
Sajjad Karim MEP Chairman, European parliament Friends of Pakistan Group
Stephen Brown Europe director, Global Poverty Project
Dr Hilary Jones Media doctor, GMTV
Dr Chris Steele Media doctor, This Morning
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