Authorities in one Pakistan province are turning to a controversial new tactic in the decades-long initiative to wipe out polio: prison.
Oct 1, 2023
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A new study, "Sensitive poliovirus detection using nested PCR and nanopore sequencing: a prospective validation study," published 17 August 2023 in Nature Microbiology, proves that using DDNS to detect polio outbreaks can ...
Aug 21, 2023
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Despite some of the most successful international vaccination campaigns in history, the poliovirus continues to circulate around the world, posing a threat of neurological damage and even paralysis to anyone who is not vaccinated.
Jun 14, 2023
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"Got Polio? Me neither. Thanks, Science." Messages like this are used in memes, posters, T-shirts and even some billboards to promote routine vaccinations. As this catchy statement reminds people of once-feared diseases of ...
Apr 27, 2023
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Health officials in Burundi have declared an outbreak of polio linked to the vaccine, the first time the paralytic disease has been detected in the East African country for more than three decades.
Mar 17, 2023
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Malnutrition is leaving children in Malawi vulnerable to the country's worst-ever cholera outbreak, the United Nations warned Tuesday as it appealed for more than $50 million to help combat the spread.
Mar 7, 2023
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The recent public health emergency declarations in New York and London due to polio infections and detection of the virus in these cities' wastewater strongly indicate that polio is no longer close to being eradicated.
Mar 6, 2023
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More than 33 million children in several southern African countries have been vaccinated against polio, part of ongoing efforts to eradicate the infectious paralytic disease that has been largely contained in much of the ...
Feb 17, 2023
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Philadelphia and Oakland County, Michigan, are joining the small list of U.S. localities that are looking for signs of polio infections in sewage, U.S. health officials said Wednesday.
Nov 30, 2022
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Children in school uniforms and toddlers with their parents lined up Monday for polio vaccinations in the Sigli town square on the northern tip of the Indonesian island of Sumatra, after four children were found infected ...
Nov 28, 2022
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Poliomyelitis, often called polio or infantile paralysis, is an acute viral infectious disease spread from person to person, primarily via the fecal-oral route. The term derives from the Greek poliós (πολιός), meaning "grey", myelós (µυελός), referring to the "spinal cord", and the suffix -itis, which denotes inflammation.
Although approximately 90% of polio infections cause no symptoms at all, affected individuals can exhibit a range of symptoms if the virus enters the blood stream. In about 1% of cases the virus enters the central nervous system, preferentially infecting and destroying motor neurons, leading to muscle weakness and acute flaccid paralysis. Different types of paralysis may occur, depending on the nerves involved. Spinal polio is the most common form, characterized by asymmetric paralysis that most often involves the legs. Bulbar polio leads to weakness of muscles innervated by cranial nerves. Bulbospinal polio is a combination of bulbar and spinal paralysis.
Poliomyelitis was first recognized as a distinct condition by Jakob Heine in 1840. Its causative agent, poliovirus, was identified in 1908 by Karl Landsteiner. Although major polio epidemics were unknown before the late 19th century, polio was one of the most dreaded childhood diseases of the 20th century. Polio epidemics have crippled thousands of people, mostly young children; the disease has caused paralysis and death for much of human history. Polio had existed for thousands of years quietly as an endemic pathogen until the 1880s, when major epidemics began to occur in Europe; soon after, widespread epidemics appeared in the United States.
By 1910, much of the world experienced a dramatic increase in polio cases and frequent epidemics became regular events, primarily in cities during the summer months. These epidemics—which left thousands of children and adults paralyzed—provided the impetus for a "Great Race" towards the development of a vaccine. Developed in the 1950s, polio vaccines are credited with reducing the global number of polio cases per year from many hundreds of thousands to around a thousand. Enhanced vaccination efforts led by the World Health Organization, UNICEF, and Rotary International could result in global eradication of the disease.
This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA
