Africa Hosts One of the Largest Vaccination Campaigns

On 25 March, more than 190,000 polio vaccinators traveled by foot and bike to immunize more than 116 million children under the age of 5 throughout 13 countries in west and central Africa. The goal was to increase childhood immunity against polio and stop the disease for good. In August 2016, four children were paralyzed by polio in the Borno state of Nigeria, an area widely considered to be the last remaining stronghold of the disease on the continent. African public health ministers from five Lake Chad Basin countries declared the outbreak a regional public health emergency and have committed to multiple synchronized immunization campaigns.