August 13 Newsletter Copy

Posted by Ron Hingst

Today Monday, August 13th: Howell Rotary members will gather for a Club Assembly to map out plans and goals for the coming your. Your attendance and participation is important to help our club continue to grow.

The Board will meet immediately after the Club Assembly.

August 15th is the First Livingston County Rotary Picnic at Howell City Park from 4 pm to 8 pm. Cost is $5 per person and bring a dish to pass. We will provide burgers, hot dogs and veggie burgers, along with games and a chance to meet Rotarians from throughout the County.

United Way Day of Caring

From Cathy Rea Dunning:

Dear Howell Rotarians, OLHSA has once again submitted our Transitional House in Howell as a LCUW Day of Caring project for August 22. We are in need of a new bathroom floor, house cleaning, and power washing and staining of back deck. The house is currently empty, so should be easily accessible.

Please help make this our most successful Day of Caring yet. Sign up today!

From Lynda Chase:

Hi Everyone, you probably remember Megan Gilshire from a year and a h alf ago when I brought her around to all the clubs to talk about her Rotary Scholarship, leaving to go New Zealand to work on her masters, and her job and degree in photo journalism. Well, Megan is back and she will be available to do presentations the month of August if you would like to hear from her. Megan does an excellent job with her presentation and I encourage all of you to try to accommodate this very busy young lady to give a presentation at your clubs. She will be leaving at the end of August for the Seattle area and again she is an excellent speaker and would be excellent for every club to hear about her Rotary Scholarship experience.

Polio Plus Update

Greetings Fellow Rotarians,

At a recent Fireside Chat, the question was asked ,"Why the 'Plus' in PolioPlus?"

To find the original meaning we have to go back to 1985 when Rotary's leadership deliberated at length over a name for the initiative. 'Polio' was chosen to signal Rotary's quest for a polio free world, and 'Plus' was added to express Rotary's conviction that a focused attack on polio would spur a dramatic increase in immunization against the five other childhood vaccine preventable diseases targeted by WHO---measles, tuberculosis,diphtheria, whooping cough and tetanus.

The plan got rather lukewarm reception from many public health leaders, but undaunted, Rotary poured volunteer effort and financial support into the program.

Gradually the salutatory effects of Rotary's dual strategy began to emerge. Social awareness of the value of immunization grew. Refrigeration facilities, transportation of vaccines and communication methods improved to the point where by the late 1980's immunization rates for the 5 childhood diseases had increased dramatically and within 2 decades there was 99% reduction in the number of polio cases world wide.

The "Plus" in PolioPlus has evolved over all this time. Today it refers to the global polio eradication legacy that can be applied to future health initiatives. Lessons learned from this historic 20 year-drive include:

Massive public education initiatives to promote immunization activities;

Vaccine deployment strategies to reach children in remote or isolated regions;

Using proper tools, such as vaccine carriers to protect vaccine in harsh temperatures and specimen containers to preserve the integrity of samples;

Forming public-private partnerships that fortify national governments' health programs;

A strengthened worldwide laboratory network that will continue to support disease surveillance efforts long after polio has been eradicated; and

Most importantly, the global polio eradication program has paved the way for cease-fire truce agreements in a number of warring nations, negotiating major humanitarian assistance in fragile environments.

If you would like to know even more..go to www.rotary.org and click on PolioPlus. Or, if you happen to have the July 2006 issue of THE ROTARIAN, go to pages 44-46.

Yours in Rotary Service,

RIO Merle