Africa has been declared free from wild polio by the independent body, the Africa Regional Certification Commission. A statement the likes of the BBC are having great thrills in announcing. But there is something that the propaganda machines fail to mention….
As of Tuesday 25th August 2020, they have declared all 47 nations of Africa free of wild polio.
This historical announcement comes four years after the continent reported its last case of wild poliovirus, in Nigeria, and 24 years after it launched an ambitious eradication campaign.
But what isn’t being talked about is the rise in vaccine derived polio cases.
Sixteen African nations are currently battling outbreaks of what’s called “vaccine-derived polio.” This is a form of polio that stems from the oral polio vaccine used in lower income countries because it is cheap and easy to administer. NPR[1]
This vaccine derived polio virus is due to the use of the oral vaccine used in poorer areas of the World. This oral vaccine contains a weakened live polio virus which replicates in the child’s intestine, then eventually is excreted out.
This would be fine in developed countries, but when poor sanitation is present, fecal matter enters the water supply and the vaccine derived polio begins to gain strength as it passes from host to host.
The vaccine derived polio virus now is causes more paralysis than the wild polio virus.
This isn’t a new problem, in 2019 ABC News reported on this:
Four African countries have reported new cases of polio linked to the oral vaccine, as global health numbers show there are now more children being paralyzed by viruses originating in vaccines than in the wild. – ABC News[2]
It’s also been an ongoing issue in India for sometime:
While India’s oral polio vaccine (OPV) drives have eliminated polio from the country, they have also resulted in over 490,000 cases of paralysis during 2000—2017, says a new study based on national surveillance statistics. – SciDev[3]
So the question is, has the vaccination programme to eliminate Polio actually achieved anything, or have they merely swapped a naturally occuring problem for a manufactured problem?
But, as you will find out shortly in the next part of my ‘Virus Hunters’ series, the real Polio story isn’t anything like you’ve been told.
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