This follows the virus being found in wastewater from two counties neighboring New York City: Rockland and Orange County from samples collected in May, June and July. While no other cases of polio have been reported in the U.S. so far, a senior official at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday that this is “just the tip of the iceberg.” and suggested that it “must be done.” there are several hundred cases in the community circulating.” This is a serious situation. Poliovirus, a disease eliminated in the US in 1979, is now being detected in three places in the US. “Polio is completely preventable and the its resurgence should be a call to action for all of us,” said New York City Health Commissioner Dr. Ashwin Vasan. Polio is a vaccine-preventable disease and these latest developments should a warning to all. Unfortunately, places like Rockland County have an incredibly low polio vaccination rate; 60.5% of two-year-olds are vaccinated compared to the state average of 79.1%. vaccine to fight the disease has in fact been one of the most celebrated vaccines in history Church bells rang across America and people flooded the streets to celebrate with parents hugging their children with relief when the vaccine field test results were announced in 1955 (this is similar to today’s drug companies issuing press releases about their vaccine efficacy data). .
The celebration was justified; Through vaccination, the US eliminated wild or naturally occurring poliovirus more than 40 years ago.
As a father of three, I cannot imagine living with the daunting threat of polio infecting my children. Before a polio vaccine was available, some parents were hesitant to even let their children go outside for fear of exposure, especially in the summer months when polio seemed to reach their maximum point If we take a trip down memory lane, the worst polio on record. The epidemic in the US occurred in 1952 when 58,000 cases were reported. More than 21,000 people were left with mild or disabling paralysis (most of the victims were children) and more than 3,000 people died. What was once a crippling disease was thwarted by mass vaccination. Polio is a highly contagious virus that spreads through person-to-person contact (most commonly through contact with the poop of an infected person). Although most people who become infected have no symptoms, about 1 in 4 people develop flu-like symptoms, and a much smaller fraction of people (less than 1 in 100) develop more severe symptoms , including paresthesia (pins and needles in the legs). ), meningitis (infection of the covering of the spinal cord and/or brain) and paralysis. Among those paralyzed, between 5% and 10% die when the virus affects their respiratory muscles. Back in the day, even those who recovered faced lifelong challenges. The World Health Organization has reported some of the consequences of the disease: deformed limbs meant that many needed legs, crutches or wheelchairs, and some needed to use breathing devices such as the iron lung, an artificial respirator invented for the treatment of polio patients. To add insult to injury, some children developed post-polio syndrome decades later, which can include muscle weakness, joint pain, and feelings of mental and physical fatigue.
But then came the polio vaccine, which provided high levels of protection, and thanks to our collective herd immunity, we’ve been able to fend off the virus (although there are still pockets of vulnerability in our communities where there are low vaccination rates).
Wild poliovirus remains endemic in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Although polio cases have declined worldwide by nearly 99%, the virus remains widespread in these two countries and the threat of imported polio cases remains. During my trip to Pakistan in 2018, I spoke with officials from Pakistan’s National Institute of Health about the importance of biopreparedness for emerging and re-emerging infectious disease threats. I remember driving through the ancient city of Multan, where thousands of Pakistani children were most recently vaccinated against polio in 2020, and thinking how difficult vaccination efforts are in many of these remote areas.
Therefore, it is not surprising that public health officials are concerned when polio is diagnosed or detected in sewage monitoring, indicating that a larger local outbreak is occurring. The risk to the public is low, as most people are protected from their childhood polio vaccines. However, people most at risk of infection include those who are unvaccinated or under-vaccinated.
London faces similar concerns to New York; The poliovirus was discovered in the city’s sewage in June. The UK Health Safety Agency (UKHSA) has responded with an unprecedented measure and one that highlights the urgency of the situation: around 1 million children under 10 in London will be offered booster shots of polio as a precautionary measure. According to UKHSA consultant epidemiologist Dr Vanessa Saliba, “Areas of London where polio is transmitted have some of the lowest rates of vaccination.” These latest incidents of polio are not one-off events. Immunization coverage is declining worldwide and the wall of immunity that past generations have built is slowly being eroded. The mistrust of the vaccine that arose unjustifiably from the Covid-19 pandemic is only driving more people not to vaccinate or to vaccinate themselves and their children. Others may have paused or delayed vaccination programs due to disruptions caused by the pandemic. The latest report from the World Health Organization shows that global immunization coverage, including the polio vaccine along with many others such as measles and rubella, fell from 86% in 2019 to 81% in 2021 . As the WHO says, “whenever a single child remains infected with poliovirus, children in all countries are at risk of contracting the disease. Poliovirus can be easily imported into a polio-free country and spread rapidly among non-immunized populations”.
Polio should have been a disease relegated to the pages of our history books. It is human behavior and the choices we make that prevent it from becoming another enduring public health success story.