World Polio Day - October 24th 2013

Coming up this month - Thursday, October 24th, 2013 marks World Polio Day.  World Polio Day was established by Rotary International over a decade ago to commemorate the birth of Jonas Salk, who led the first team to develop a vaccine against poliomyelitis. Use of this inactivated poliovirus vaccine and subsequent widespread use of the oral poliovirus, developed by Albert Sabin, led to the establishment of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) in 1988. Since then, GPEI has reduced polio worldwide by 99%.  Rotary, along with our partners, has reduced polio cases by 99 percent worldwide since our first project to vaccinate children in the Philippines in 1979. We are close to eradicating polio, but we have not quite finished the job.  World Polio Day is a time to commemorate what we have done, and to renew our energy to finish the job in the near future!

To find out how you can make a difference in this effort, follow this link:   https://www.rotary.org/en/take-action/end-polio