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Bill Gates.
(photo credit: WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM / WIKIMEDIA COMMUNES)
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LONDON – Taliban leaders in Afghanistan are opposed to global efforts to end polio, but Afghanistan and Pakistan must continue their fight to "get to zero," philanthropist Bill Gates said Monday.
In a phone interview with Reuters, Gates said he is optimistic about the global plan to eradicate the paralyzing viral disease, but said the conflict and power struggles in Afghanistan are holding back progress.
"The big problem is still with the Taliban," said Gates, whose Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, a multi-billion dollar philanthropist, is one of the major funders of the campaign polio eradication.
Poliomyelitis is a virus that spreads to underserved areas. It attacks the nervous system and can cause irreversible paralysis a few hours after infection. Children under five are the most vulnerable, but vaccination helps prevent polio.
The success of the reduction in the number of cases in the world is largely due to intense national and regional immunization campaigns in infants and children.
The latest statistics from the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) show that there have been 33 cases of polio in 2018 and six so far in 2019, including 16 in Pakistan and 23 in Afghanistan. These two countries, plus Nigeria, are the last countries where the disease is endemic.
The GPEI, which includes WHO, the Gates Foundation, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and others, launched a campaign to eliminate polio in 1988, while the The disease was endemic in 125 countries and paralyzed nearly 1,000 children a day worldwide. .
Since then, the number of cases has been reduced by at least 99%. But eradicating the disease – something that has never been achieved with another human disease, smallpox – turns out to be a long and arduous task.
"We have to bring Afghanistan and Pakistan back to zero," said Gates. "We need government donors to stay engaged."
Microsoft co-founder billionaire Gates said the global polio program was progressing in Pakistan and had good relations with Prime Minister Imran Khan, who put the fight against polio first.
According to Gates, instability in Afghanistan is the only "potential negative point" in the region, where Taliban leaders do not seem to have a single policy but "decide what they want and what they want. they do not allow "as regards vaccination against polio.
"That's what we have no predictability or control over," he said. "Sometimes they prevent campaigns from happening, but the ideal is when they allow home delivery (vaccine)."
Gates pointed to India, which was responsible 12 years ago for 70% of all polio cases. This week marks the fifth anniversary of the last case recorded.
Gates had previously described the challenge of eliminating polio in India, which has 1.3 billion inhabitants and some very poor sanitation areas, such as "mind boggling". The success there, he said, shows that polio can eventually be eliminated around the world.
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