Update: Polio this week – As of 22 May 2013
Global Polio Eradication Initiative
http://www.polioeradication.org/Dataandmonitoring/Poliothisweek.aspx

[Editor’s extract and bolded text]
. A wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) case has been confirmed in Kenya, the first WPV in the country since July 2011, with onset of paralysis 30 April. The location is a refugee camp in the Dadaab area, close to the border with Somalia, where a child was paralysed by polio near the capital Mogadishu on 18 April. Outbreak response activities are being planned. See ‘Horn of Africa’ section for more.

Pakistan
. No new WPV cases were reported in the past week. The total number of WPV cases for 2013 remains eight. The most recent WPV case had onset of paralysis on 24 April (WPV1 from Federally Administered Tribal Areas – FATA).

. One new cVDPV2 case was reported in the past week (from North Waziristan, FATA), bringing the total number of cVDPV2 cases for 2013 to four. It is the most recent cVDPV2 case in the country and had onset of paralysis on 22 April.

. It is the second cVDPV2 case from North Waziristan, an area where immunizations have been suspended by local leaders since last June. To minimize the risk of a major outbreak in this area, it is critical that access to children is granted as quickly as possible. Immunizations in neighbouring high-risk areas are being intensified, to further boost population immunity levels in those areas and prevent further spread of this outbreak.

. Pakistan is also affected by transmission of WPV1, with eight cases this year (compared to 16 cases for the same period in 2012). Wild poliovirus type 3 (WPV3) has not been detected in the country in more than 12 months (since April 2012, from Khyber Agency, FATA).

. Confirmation of these latest cases underscores the risk which ongoing polio transmission (be it due to WPV or cVDPV) in the country continues to pose to children everywhere, and in particular to children living in areas where access has not been possible for extended periods of time.

. The security situation continues to be monitored closely, in consultation with law enforcement agencies. Immunization activities continue to be implemented, in some areas staggered or postponed, depending on the security situation at the local level.

Horn of Africa
. One new WPV case was reported in the past week (WPV1 from a refugee camp in Dadaab, north-eastern Kenya), with onset of paralysis on 30 April. It is the first WPV in Kenya since July 2011, and it follows last week’s confirmation of a WPV1 case from Somalia (onset of paralysis 18 April).

. The child is a four-month-old girl. Two healthy contacts of the child tested positive for WPV1. Dadaab hosts several large refugee camps, housing nearly 500,000 people from across the Horn of Africa, including from Somalia.

. An emergency outbreak response is being planned, to reach nearly 440,000 children aged less than 15 years across Dadaab, beginning on 26 May, using bivalent OPV. Further campaigns are planned across a wider area, including parts of Nairobi, on 9 June, followed by large-scale subnational immunization days (SNIDs) in late June.

. In Somalia, an outbreak response immunization activity was held last week (14-16 May), to reach 350,000 children across Banadir region (including Mogadishu), with further activities across Banadir and other regions planned for 26-29 May and again in early June.

. Immunization campaigns are also planned in other areas of the Horn of Africa, notably Ethiopia and Yemen, to urgently boost population immunity levels and minimize the risk of spread of the outbreak. Countries across the Horn of Africa are at significant risk, due to large-scale population movements and persistent immunity gaps in some areas. In 2005, polio spread across the African continent, and into Yemen and the Horn of Africa, resulting in over 700 cases. The adoption of international outbreak response guidelines and the development of new vaccines since then, have – when fully implemented – considerably reduced the severity and duration of such outbreaks.