Q ‘We can eradicate polio from the world’

The viral polio disease has over the years crippled hundreds of thousands of children in Africa and other parts of the world. But on August 25, some four years after Africa’s last case was recorded in northern Nigeria, the continent was declared free of wild polio. Still, vaccine-derived strains of the virus remain in more than a dozen African countries. Pakistan and Afghanistan are the only two countries in the world where the debilitating virus remains endemic. Polio is transmitted from person to person, mainly through a faecal-oral route or, less frequently, through contaminated water or food. It largely affects children under the age of five, multiplying inside the intestines from where it can invade the nervous system and cause paralysis, according to the World Health Organization. There is no cure for polio, but the disease can be prevented through the oral administration of a vaccine. Last month, Dr Tunji Funsho, a cardiologist based in Lagos, Nigeria, was named one of TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people of the year for his work in eradicating wild polio in Africa. Al Jazeera spoke to Funsho, chair of Rotary International’s Nigeria National PolioPlus Committee, about the progress and challenges in tackling the viral disease, as well as the effect of the coronavirus pandemic on immunisation campaigns. Al Jazeera: Africa was declared wild polio-free earlier this year. What does this certification mean for the continent as a whole and its people? Tunji Funsho: It’s a major milestone for us. As recently as 1996, when the Kick Polio out of Africa initiative was inaugurated through the prompting of Rotary International by former South African President Nelson Mandela, Africa was having 70,000 cases of wild poliovirus every year. It was that initiative that galvanised African countries to start regular mass campaigns, going from house to house to make sure that we don’t lose any child with the oral polio vaccine. style="width: 100%; height: 100%; position: absolute; top: 0; bottom: 0; right: 0; left: 0;">