Church workers rejoice as India declared polio-free
Feb.12,2014:The World Health Organization - WHO, declared India "polio-free" Feb.
11, church health workers celebrated and reflected on the challenges they faced convincing
parents to allow their children to get the vaccine. "It is a moment of great of joy
for all the health workers," said Father Tomi Thomas, director-general of the Catholic
Health Association of India, (CHAI). Many of CHAI’s 3,400 Catholic health care centers
were partners in the government's polio eradication program. "At least 1 million
children were reached through our centers annually," said the priest, a member of
the Indian Missionary Society. While the polio eradication campaign has raised
the health awareness among the poor, the Head of CHAI noted that "the challenges
are too many." "The threat of re-infection looms large. And we need to be vigilant.
Keeping polio out is not the only part of what India has to achieve to secure the
lives of all its newborn children," said Father Thomas. John Shumlansky, Catholic
Relief Services' (CRS) country representative in India, attended national celebrations,
led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, at an indoor stadium in New Delhi Feb. 11. Though
India -- a nation of 1.27 billion people -- recorded 741 cases of polio in 2009, no
incident of the crippling disease had been reported since January 2011. Summing
up CRS involvement in India's fight against the disease that affected 200,000 annually
in the 1980s, Shumlansky said his agency helped mobilize people to facilitate the
government's polio immunization program and vaccinate more than 5 million children
from 2008 to 2012. While the government provided the polio vaccine and oral drops
to the church centers, the cost of mobilizing the teams was sponsored by CRS, the
U.S. bishops' international relief and development agency. Source: Ucan