World Polio Day

Why support Polio Eradication?

Since 1988, cases of polio have plummeted, due to the Polio Plus campaign started by an Australian Rotarian.

This campaign became a joint effort with the World Health Organisation, Governments and other

donors and has eradicated polio in many countries.

The only wild polio cases are now found in Pakistan and Afghanistan and are numbered in the tens each year, rather than the hundreds of thousands. Unfortunately, the threat still remains for polio to take off around the world as vaccination rates drop,

with polio still only a plane ride away. The threat will not be removed until both of these countries are polio free,

In our District, Gary Newton is the leader of our campaign to have Rotarians sign up to the Polio Plus Society, by pledging to donate $100 or more to the Polio Plus Fund at The Rotary Foundation. Every dollar that is donated to this fund is matched times two by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation - so one dollar becomes three, to be used to fight polio.

Gary is passionate about this fight to end polio, as he contracted polio as a child and still endures from the ongoing effects of this debilitating disease. He knows this fight is not about numbers - it is about people.

Children who may die of suffocation as paralysis stops their chest moving, children who cannot walk, children who grow up with permanent disability, and adults who seemly recovered, only to discover new body issues as they age, from post-polio syndrome.

Polio is an insidious disease that steals children's lives and childhoods.

It is vital that we continue to fund the campaign to rid the world of its threat.

Make this World Polio Day the day you commit to support this work by joining the Polio Plus Society