Rotary Rig for October 16th, 2017 (Oct 13, 2017)

Rotary Club of Casper WY

Meeting Summary

10/23/2017

President Elect Dick Jay called the meeting to order promptly at 12:30, with the ring of the bell and welcomed everyone to today’s meeting.

Inspiration, Pledge, 4-Way Test:

Dan Odell

Greeters:

Martha Rakestraw and Dave Bruni were our greeters today and Martha introduced the members who brought guests:

Charles Schoenwolf introduced Carly Applewhite (Home Health) and she introduced Miamie Sleep (Mimi’s House);
Liz Becher introduced visiting Rotarian and Past District Governor Dave Scriven (Five Trails);
We had visiting Rotarians Deanna Pickering (Reveille), and Assistant District Governor Helen Bishop (Jackson Supper Club);
Denise Prugh introduced Fred DeVore (Peterbilt);
Craig Valdez introduced Mandy Fable (Lander Rotary Club and WY Community Foundation);

Song:

Gary Pehrson had us all stand and lead us in singing “Take Me Out To The Ball Game” in preparation for the World Series.

Family of Rotary:

Deb Theriault announced that they are the proud Grandparents of a bouncing baby boy that was born last Tuesday and is doing great, see Grandma for pictures.

Rotarians of the Week:

Charlie Shopp nominated Jim Anderson and Bill Mortimer for the annual Rotary Bird Hunt.
Cori Burton nominated John and Lauren Griffith for participating in the Dancing With the Stars of Casper this upcoming Saturday.
Tim Havasi nominated Brett Osborne for being invited to the Jack Daniels International BBQ Competition in Tennessee.

Student of The Month:

No students this week.

Announcements:

Cori Burton let everyone know to be sure and go to the Dancing with the Stars of Casper this Saturday evening.

Program (Carl Tinstman Polio Eradication Update):

Liz Becher introduced our speaker today, Mr. Carl Tinstman, A 30-year veteran of the United Nations, Carl served in UNICEF Headquarters in New York, at the World Health Organization (W.H.O.) Headquarters in Geneva, and in assignments in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. In the final five years of his career, he worked from the headquarters of the W.H.O., as a partnership manager for the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, and consulted for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Carl is a member of the Boulder Rotary Club in Boulder, Colorado. Carl’s presentation will provide a retrospective on the global 32-year effort to eradicate polio, Rotary’s role in it, and offer a glimpse into the future of polio eradication. Where are the current problem countries/regions? Why is it taking so long to finish them? When will we finish? Could we possibly fail? October is Rotary International Polio Awareness Month all over the world.

Carl gave us a great history of Polio and the eradication efforts and Rotary International’s role. Polio has been around for the history of the world, is incurable and paralyzes for life. Only 1 in 200 get the paralysis but they can still shed the disease to others. It can be prevented by vaccine and children under age 5 are the most at risk to catch the disease. There are three types of Polio virus, Type 1, Type 2, and Type 3. Type 2 is eradicated since 1999, Type 3 may be eradicated as they have not seen it since July 2012 in India. He showed us a picture of Iron Lungs which were used to help people breathe when the Polio virus affected their lungs, he said that there are still a few people that are surviving in the iron lungs. The Vaccines came along in the 1950’s which was a wonderful event, as the entire country was terrified, and so began the vaccination across the country. The injectable vaccine was released in 1955 and the oral in 1969, with the oral vaccine it made it a lot easier to do widespread vaccination as volunteers can administer the oral where the injectable required trained personnel to administer it. In 1979 Polio was eradicated in the U.S and that same year Rotarians in the Philippines met with the government and started a country wide vaccination program and Rotary International signed an agreement with the Philippine Department of Health and similar programs were started in other countries such as Haiti, Morocco and other countries. In 1985 Rotarians made a promise to eradicate polio and they pledged to raise 120 million dollars to accomplish this and Polio Plus was born at the Rotary International Convention. In 1985, 125 countries of the world were endemic with Polio. 350,000 cases per year were occurring worldwide. In 1988 Rotary International spearheaded the launch of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative which had four core partners WHO, Unicef, CDC and Rotary International. In 2007 the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation joined as a partner. In 1988 they also announced that against the target of 120 million they had raised 247 million dollars. The target of the year 2000 was set as the year that Polio would be eradicated. The number of cases of Polio began to dramatically drop, in 1999 we had 60 countries that were endemic then in 2002 we were at 7 or 8 countries but continued to have 1 to 2 thousand cases per year so in 2000 we changed the date to 2002 then 2005 then we quit making projections we are just moving forward to eradicate it. In January of 2011 we had the last case of Polio in India which was a huge accomplishment. With that then we only have 3 countries left with Polio, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. Then in 2014 we saw the last case of wild Polio in Nigeria which would make Africa Polio free, we thought, and we were on a roll. Then we had CVDPD cases start showing up which are cases caused by the spread of the virus from the oral vaccine which is ingested by the child and then excreted which in areas where there is a low number of children vaccinated can cause the strain to mutate as it circulates and it becomes strong enough to cause paralysis and then other children can be infected with Polio. This is extremely rare but does occur. In 2016 we thought we were in good shape, Pakistan only had 20 cases of wild virus Polio, Afghanistan 13, and only 5 cases of CVPD were caught, then in August Nigeria detected 4 cases of wild virus that had been circulating for several years so it had not been completely eradicated. This was a real set back in Nigeria. So far for 2017 YTD we have seen 12 cases of wild virus total for Pakistan and Afghanistan, zero in Nigeria, however, 61 cases of CVPD or vaccine derived virus have been found 52 of them in Syria where there are very few vaccinated children. This is a problem but not a disaster. They do environmental samples from sewage in these countries and this year in Pakistan they found 75 cases of wild virus type 1 being found in the samples which means the virus is still circulating and can still infect someone. In Afghanistan the security problems are causing the vaccinations to be unable to be done. Carl then told us that his prediction for the eradication is that we will see more cases of Wild Polio in 2017 from Pakistan and Afghanistan so the soonest we will see the last case will be in 2018. He predicts that we will also see more CVPD cases in other countries so the certification that Polio is eradicated will not occur until 2021 at the earliest as there has to be three years with no cases before it can be certified by the Global Certification Commission. We will get this finished, there has been great success stories and there is much to be excited about. If we were to walk away from this Polio would be back full force in a short period of time and all of that work would have been for naught so we must continue the fight. He told us that a British film, Breathe, has been released this week about a Polio victim and we should go see it. Rotarians made a promise and Rotarians keep their promises. He then took questions from the audience, what a great presentation.

President Elect Dick Jay concluded the meeting at 1:28; letting us know that next week we are meeting at the Parkway Plaza for the final meeting there, then we will be permanently back here at the Ramkota Inn. The program will be our exchange student Frida telling us about herself.