What will become of the polio network?

News What will become of the polio network? Polio could be history within a few years, but what will become of the vast network set up to fight the disease is unclear. Health experts fear that once polio is eradicated, donors will stop funding the diversified network, which now helps immunize children against many other diseases, fight outbreaks and respond to natural disasters. When a massive earthquake ravaged northern Pakistan in October 2005, the initial aid provided to survivors in many areas came from highly trained World Health Organization (WHO) polio medical officers. In many African countries, it is these same polio officers who lead vaccination drives to crush other diseases, including hepatitis B and measles, and who detect outbreaks, like Marburg fever in Angola in 2004. While fighting to end poliomyelitis, thousands of polio medical officers have adapted their skills and duties to become vital cogs in national health networks. But leading WHO officials fear that donors will stop funding the massive global network altogether after polio's eradication, resulting in the loss of a vital resource that is now crucial to immunization campaigns and outbreak responses in many countries. " Our teams not only helped in the earthquake zone, but they also helped to develop guidelines for avian flu surveillance and now routinely collect data on measles and neonatal tetanus within their acute flaccid paralysis (AFP) work, " Dr Nima Abid, WHO's polio team leader in Pakistan, told the Bulletin. WHO's diverse anti-polio approach , made possible by an annual US$ 100 million in funding under the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, has brought the disease to the brink of eradication. At the same time, it has helped to boost health services in many developing countries, reducing mortality and morbidity levels for measles, malaria and vitamin A deficiency in the process. … our fear is that as soon as the last case of polio occurs, it is going to be hard to maintain the funding to even continue the surveillance necessary to certify eradication. Some 3300 AFP surveillance and response staff operate in 54 countries, along with thousands more polio communication and social mobilization workers. " This is not a group that just detects diseases but it also responds, does local planning and mapping , gives vaccines to children and develops response mechanisms , " said Dr David Heymann, assistant director-general for WHO's Communi-cable Diseases cluster of departments. " With …