a1441: AP: Polio outbreak. Hispanola (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: JD Lemieux <lxhaiti@yahoo.com>


Haitian and Dominican health officials mount campaign to
prevent new polio outbreak

By MICHAEL NORTON
Associated Press
Posted March 21 2002

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- Shaken by a rare outbreak of polio
in Haiti and the Dominican Republic, health officials have
mounted an island-wide immunization campaign, health
officials said Wednesday.

In the third week of May, the governments of the two
countries, which share the Caribbean island of Hispaniola,
will inoculate 3 million children under 10 years old in
schools and homes, said Patrick Delorme, a Haitian health
official in charge of the campaign.











Collaboration is essential because of the countries' shared
border, where border crossing is constant, director of the
Dominican Extended Immunization Program, Dr. Zacarias
Garib, said Wednesday.

``The outbreak was a wake-up call,'' said Claude Surena,
aide to Haiti's health minister. ``We realized we had to
vaccinate all children on both sides of the border, to
control the results, and maintain active surveillance.''

Between July 2000 and July 2001, 21 children contracted
polio from a vaccine virus that had mutated, according to a
report by Science magazine last week.

Of those, 13 were in the Dominican Republic, and eight were
in Haiti. Two children died in Haiti. The outbreak was the
first in the Americas since 1991, but there have been no
new cases reported since last year.

The oral vaccine, usually given in a sugar cube, gives
patients a mild form of polio that results in immunity to
the viral disease, which is marked by inflammation of nerve
cells in the brain stem and spinal cord.

Because mutations can occur, developed countries now only
use vaccine injections.

Science magazine reported that the children who contracted
polio in last year's outbreak had not been vaccinated, and
probably contracted the virus from other children who were
given a mutated version of the vaccine in 1998-1999.

Most developing countries still use the oral vaccination
because it costs less and is easy for untrained health
workers to use.

Surena said the May vaccination campaign will use the oral
vaccination because of the cost, which the two countries
are sharing.

About 400 Cuban health care workers will help with the
campaign, to be carried out in schools, he said. Health
workers will also go door to door to vaccinate children who
are not yet in school.

The United Nations Children's Fund and the Pan American
Health Organization, or PAHO, are also providing support.

About 90 percent of children have been vaccinated on the
island in earlier campaigns not coordinated between the two
islands, PAHO director George Alleyne said.

Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere,
with one of the region's worst life expectancy rates at 49
years. People live an average of 73 years in the Dominican
Republic, and 77 years in the United States.

On the Net:

Science magazine: http://www.sciencemag.org

Pan American Health Organization: http://www.paho.org

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