The landlocked East African country of Malawi on Friday became the first country in the continent to report the first wild polio outbreak in several years.
Africa Daily News, New York reports that the wild type 1 poliovirus was discovered in a child in the city of Lilongwe, the World Health Organisation (WHO) announced yesterday.
Laboratory tests had shown that it had apparently been brought in from Pakistan, it said.
Read Also: WHO Declares Nigeria Polio Free
‘As long as wild polio exists anywhere in the world all countries remain at risk of importation of the virus,’ said WHO regional director Matshidiso Moeti.
The organisation will support local health authorities in the south-east African country to ensure that the case remains isolated and does not spread, she said.
Polio is a contagious infectious disease and can cause paralysis and death.
Except for Afghanistan and Pakistan, all countries in the world had beaten the wild polioviruses.
Africa Daily News, New York recalls that the last case in Africa was registered in Nigeria in 2016.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation (WHO), Country Representative for Nigeria, Dr. Walter Mulombo, had earlier revealed that Nigeria and other African countries would no longer receive funds given to support polio eradication activities from January 2022.
According to him, Nigeria and other countries on the continent had been removed from the priority list having been declared polio-free.
A statement by the Chief Press Secretary of the FCT Minister, Anthony Ogunleye, quoted Mulombo as saying this when he led a delegation of the WHO to update the minister on key public health issues.
He, however, called for improved funding for disease control programmes and primary health care in Nigeria.
The WHO boss added that adequate funding at the state and area council levels would help strengthen and improve immunization services.
AFRICA DAILY NEWS, NEW YORK
