Polio centre stage at African leaders summit

The summit will seek to prepare Africa for its future, build upon current progress and consider lessons learned from the past.
“A polio-free Africa is one of the best legacies that the people of Africa, its leaders, and the African Union can pass on to the next generation,” said a federal health ministry statement ahead of the summit.
Transmission of wild polio virus (type 1) has dropped 87% last year alone, and the last infection recorded was last July.
The country could successfully interrupt polio transmission, if no new case is recorded by July 2015.
No infection involving polio virus type 3 has been recorded in the last 23 months, and genetic clusters of the virus have also declined from eight in 2013 to just one last year – an 88% reduction.
This feat has “been achieved as a result of over two year’s meticulous improvement in the programme with award winning innovations,” said the ministry’s director for press and public relations Ayotunde Adesugba.
The summit “provides a unique and historic opportunity for the leaders of Africa, under the chairmanship of Mauritania, to express their strong commitment to deliver a polio-free continent for children of all future generations and encourage the last remaining countries and their leaders to redouble their efforts in the final stages of this long battle to consign polio to the history books,” said the federal health ministry.