Most Polio Victims Were Vaccinated – 201 out of 203 cases were vaccinated

Out of the total 203 cases of polio reported from across the country this year, 201 had received polio vaccines. This was stated by the Health Ministry in a reply in Parliament.

While this raises doubts about the efficacy of the polio drops, Health Ministry officials said this could have happened due to inadequate intake of the vaccine.

A senior official in the World Health Organisation also said: “This could have happened as they may not have got enough polio drops to develop full immunity.”

A Health Ministry official also said that the nutritional status of the child should also be considered. “Undernourished children cannot produce good antibodies. As a result, the vaccine becomes ineffective. About 54.3 per cent children are victims of malnutrition and hence the failure rate,” he said.

Apart from malnutrition, high population density, overcrowding, poor sanitation and ignorance contribute to the high incidence of polio in the state.

Quoting a latest study by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) in Moradabad, the official said: “According to them, children above three years of age in Moradabad are well protected from polio as they have received adequate doses. However, children from 6-12 months are not receiving adequate doses. The international health agencies say that a child should get at least 15-16 doses to develop full immunity against the disease,” he said.

Source: Indian Express 1st May 2008.

The Only Cases Of Polio Since 1979 Were Caused By The Vaccine

‘The last case of poliomyelitis in the United States due to indigenously acquired wild poliovirus occurred in 1979; however, as a consequence of oral poliovirus vaccine (OPV) use that began in 1961, an average of 9 cases of vaccine-associated paralytic poliomyelitis (VAPP) were confirmed each year from 1961 through 1989. To reduce the VAPP burden, national vaccination policy changed in 1997 from reliance on OPV to options for a sequential schedule of inactivated poliovirus vaccine (IPV) followed by OPV. In 2000, an exclusive IPV schedule was adopted.’

From 1990 through 1999, 61 cases of paralytic poliomyelitis were reported; 59 (97%) of these were VAPP (1 case per 2.9 million OPV doses distributed), 1 case was imported, and 1 case was indeterminate. Thirteen cases occurred during the 1997-1999 transitional policy period and were associated with the all-OPV schedule; none occurred with the IPV-OPV schedule. No cases occurred after the United States implemented the all-IPV policy in 2000. The last imported poliomyelitis case occurred in 1993 and the last case of VAPP occurred in 1999.

Conclusion The change in polio vaccination policy from OPV to exclusive use of IPV was successfully implemented; this change led to the elimination of VAPP in the United States.’

(JAMA. 2004;292:1696-1701).

Polio Occurring As A Consequence Of Diphtheria Vaccination

Dr. Geffen in London UK described 30 children under the age of 5 who had been vaccinated with diphtheria and/or whooping cough vaccines and went on to develop polio within 4 weeks of the vaccines.

‘The paralysis affecting, in particular, the limb of injection. In 7 other recently vaccinated cases, paralysis occured but not in the limb that had received the injection’.

Bradford Hill, A., Knoweldon, J. 1950. “Inoculation and Poliomyelitis”. BMJ, July 1st, pp 1-6.

Department of Health in 1950 Recommended That Diphtheria And Multiple Vaccines Not Be Used In Areas Where There Was Polio

it was reported that of 112 cases of paralysis admitted to the Park Hospital, London, during 1947-1949, 14 were paralyzed in the limb which had received one or more of a course of immunizing injections within the previous two months. In the majority of cases, the interval between the last injection and the onset of paralysis was between 9 and 14 days. Again, combined whooping cough, diphtheria and tetanus injections were involved. This outbreak of polio followed an intensive immunization campaign during that time, 1947-49. Following these findings, the Ministry of Health recommended that diphtheria and triple vaccines should not be used in areas where polio was naturally present. From that time onwards, the incidence of paralytic polio decreased rapidly in Britain, even prior to the advent of Salk vaccination…”

BMJ., July 29th, 1950.

Incidence of Polio Statistically Greater In the Recently Vaccinated Than In The Unvaccinated

Following a polio epidemic in 1949 a scandal broke in Britain after it was discovered that children were getting polio after being vaccinated against diphtheria and whooping cough with symptoms of paralysis showing in the vaccinated limb within 28 days of the first injection.

The Archives of Disease in Childhood reported 17 cases of polio after various injections.

Martin, J.K. 1950. “Local paralysis in children after injections” Arch. Dis. Childhood, March 1950, pp 1-5.

69 Vaccinated Children Get Polio From The Vaccine. Excreted Vaccine Polio Virus Ends Up In Water Supply And Can Spread And Infect Unvaccinated Children

A polio outbreak in Nigeria was caused by the vaccine designed to stop it, international health officials say, leaving at least 69 children paralyzed. The CDC and the World Health Organization announced the cause of the polio outbreak last week, even though they knew about it last year.

Outbreaks caused by the oral vaccine’s live virus have happened before. But the continuing Nigerian outbreak is the biggest ever caused by the vaccine.

Officials now worry that the latest vaccine-caused Nigerian outbreak could trigger another vaccine scare.

Experts say such outbreaks only happen when too few children are vaccinated. In northern Nigeria, only about 39 percent of children are fully protected against polio.

The oral polio vaccine contains a weakened version of polio virus. Children who have been vaccinated excrete the virus, and in unsanitary conditions it can end up in the water supply, spreading to unvaccinated children.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071005/ap_on_he_me/nigeria_polio_paradox

Vaccine Associated Paralytic Polio

BACKGROUND. In Romania the rate of vaccine-associated paralytic poliomyelitis is for unexplained reasons 5 to 17 times higher than in other countries. Long ago it was noted that intramuscular injections administered during the incubation period of wild-type poliovirus infection increased the risk of paralytic disease (a phenomenon known as “provocation” poliomyelitis). We conducted a case-control study to explore the association between intramuscular injections and vaccine-associated poliomyelitis in Romania. …RESULTS. Of the 31 children with vaccine-associated disease, 27 (87 percent) had received one or more intramuscular injections within 30 days before the onset of paralysis, as compared with 77 of the 151 controls (51 percent) (matched odds ratio, 31.2; 95 percent confidence interval, 4.0 to 244.2). Nearly all the intramuscular injections were of antibiotics, and the association was strongest for the patients who received 10 or more injections (matched odds ratio for > or = 10 injections as compared with no injections, 182.1; 95 percent confidence interval, 15.2 to 2186.4). The risk of paralytic disease was strongly associated with injections given after the oral polio virus vaccine, but not with injections given before or at the same time as the vaccine (matched odds ratio, 56.7; 95 percent confidence interval, 8.9 to infinity). The attributable risk in the population for intramuscular injections given in the 30 days before the onset of paralysis was 86 percent (95 percent confidence interval, 66 to 95 percent); that is, we estimate that 86 percent of the cases of vaccine-associated paralytic poliomyelitis in this population might have been prevented by the elimination of intramuscular injections within 30 days after exposure to oral poliovirus vaccine. CONCLUSIONS. Provocation paralysis, previously described only for wild-type poliovirus infection, may rarely occur in a child who receives multiple intramuscular injections shortly after exposure to oral poliovirus vaccine, either as a vaccine recipient or through contact with a recent recipient. This phenomenon may explain the high rate of vaccine-associated paralytic poliomyelitis in Romania, where the use of intramuscular injections of antibiotics in infants with febrile illness is common.

Strebel PM, et al. Paralytic poliomyelitis in Romania, 1984-1992. Evidence for a high risk of vaccine-associated disease and reintroduction of wild-virus infection. Am J Epidemiol. 1994 Dec 15;140(12):1111-24. PMID: 7998593; UI: 95091240.

Cases of Polio Rise After Vaccine Was Introduced – Even When Some Children Were Vaccinated 25 Times!

Four years ago, the government introduced a vaccine carrying P1, the deadliest strain of the virus.

But experts said, though most children have been repeatedly vaccinated, polio-related paralysis has been on the rise.

“Children are getting more than 25 doses. There are studies to show that in malnourished children, the vaccine can be fatal. It actually causes paralysis, so it is contraindicated in undernourished population,” said Sathyamala, Epidemiologist.

The government’s own data shows that in Uttar Pradesh, the cases of polio related paralysis rose from 3789 cases in 2004 to 10,055 after the P1 vaccine was introduced and six doses were given the next year.

The number had risen to 11,538 after children received nine doses.

Source: NDTV, 9th April 2008.

Despite Numerous Campaigns With Oral Polio Vaccine, Polio Has Persisted

ndia’s health ministry is evaluating a proposal to introduce the injectable polio vaccine next year in one region of India, questioning for the first time its three decade policy of using only oral vaccines to eradicate polio.

India accounted for 874 of the total of 1208 polio cases last year in the four countries with endemic polio (the others being Pakistan, Nigeria, and Afghanistan). Despite numerous campaigns with the oral vaccine, polio has persisted.

Source: BMJ 2008;337:a2809.

10 Month Old Fully Vaccinated Baby Gets Polio

Pakistan reported its 18th polio case of the year on Sunday when a ten-month-old child belonging to tehsil Shujabad of district Multan was confirmed by the National Institute of Health (NIH) as having been afflicted by the crippling disease.

According to experts, the case is from an area that is part of the polio reservoir axis that extends from northern Balochistan to the southern tip of Punjab. “Cases in southern Punjab represent the last remnants of the 2008 outbreak, when the province reported 31 of the 117 cases in total; that was the highest number of polio cases reported in Pakistan in five years,” an expert commented.

The latest case, Tahzeeb, is reported by the district health authorities to have received all routine and additional doses of polio vaccine during different campaigns right since birth. “The child’s immune system may not have responded to the vaccine doses; this can happen in malnourished children and among those living in squalid conditions resulting in frequent episodes of diarrhoea, which do not allow vaccine absorption,” a paediatrician reflected.

Source: The International News, 8th June 2009.

Polio in an 18 month old baby who had had THREE polio vaccinations

With the confirmation of yet another polio case, the total toll of reported polio victims across Sindh province has reached 6 in the current year, Geo news reported.

The Director project of IPI Sindh Dr. Mazhar Khamisani told Geo news the fresh case was confirmed in Tando Alha Yar.

The case is an eighteen-months-old child Dileep who had received three doses of anti-polio while four cases had been confirmed in Karachi, one in Kunbhar district earlier, taking the total number of confirmed polio cases to 6 in Sindh, sources said.

Source: GEO Pakistan, 21st June 2009.

Baby Gets Polio After TEN Polio Vaccines! – this baby had been vaccinated every month of life

From the time her daughter was born last summer in this remote village of rice paddies and mud huts, Parmeshwar Paswan made sure her baby was vaccinated by medical teams who arrived each month. Now 14 months old, Abhi Lasha has received the pink-coloured oral polio vaccine as many as 10 times.

It made no difference.

Seven weeks ago, Abhi Lasha contracted polio, the highly contagious crippler of children. In the days since her diagnosis, six more cases surfaced in villages near her home.

Paswan was inconsolable.

“I did what I was supposed to,” the 20-year-old mother said, seated in the middle of the village, surrounded by oxen and chickens and children with tattered clothing.

It is confusing for her to understand how her daughter could contract polio after all the efforts made to prevent it.

Doctors with the World Health Organization (WHO) say malnutrition probably played a role in Abhi Lasha’s case. She may have been so undernourished that the vaccine couldn’t be absorbed properly, even after so many courses of treatment.

Source: thestar.com, 11th July 2009.

4 Daughters in a Family Crippled By Polio Despite Mother Being Vaccinated in Pregnancy and All 4 Daughters Being Vaccinated

In a tragic case, four daughters of a family at Dhumat-Harinababi village under Kendrapara block were found afflicted with polio since their birth despite the mother and the children being administered the polio vaccine.

The four daughters of Maheswar Sahu have been rendered unable to walk and stand on their feet due to the dreaded disease.

According to Maheswar Sahu, all his eight daughters had taken polio doses but four of them got afflicted with polio and have lost the ability to walk or stand.

He said his 27-year-old and eldest daughter Anusaya Sahu, 19-year-old daughter Ranjulata, 17-year-old Mili Sahu and 15-year-old Kuni Sahu have been crippled for life.

Their mother claimed that she too had taken polio doses when the children were in her womb. She also maintained that she had given polio vaccine to all the daughters who now became victims of the disease.

Source: new kerala.com, 14 August 2009.

Vaccine Virus is Mutating and Spreading The Disease

Polio, the dreaded paralyzing disease stamped out in the industrialized world, is spreading in Nigeria. And health officials say in some cases, it’s caused by the vaccine used to fight it.

In July, the World Health Organization issued a warning that this vaccine-spread virus might extend beyond Africa. So far, 124 Nigerian children have been paralyzed this year — about twice those afflicted in 2008.

Nigeria and most other poor nations use an oral polio vaccine because it’s cheaper, easier, and protects entire communities.

But it is made from a live polio virus — albeit weakened — which carries a small risk of causing polio for every million or so doses given. In even rarer instances, the virus in the vaccine can mutate into a deadlier version that ignites new outbreaks.

So when WHO officials discovered a polio outbreak in Nigeria was sparked by the polio vaccine itself, they assumed it would be easier to stop than a natural ”wild” virus.

They were wrong.

In 2007, health experts reported that amid Nigeria’s ongoing outbreak of wild polio viruses, 69 children had also been paralyzed in a new outbreak caused by the mutation of a vaccine’s virus.

Back then, WHO said the vaccine-linked outbreak would be swiftly overcome — yet two years later, cases continue to mount. They have since identified polio cases linked to the vaccine dating back as far as 2005.

It is a worrying development for officials who hope to end polio epidemics in India and Africa by the end of this year, after missing several earlier deadlines. ”It’s very disturbing,” said Dr. Bruce Aylward, who heads the polio department at the World Health Organization.

Source: The New York Times, 14 August 2009.

Surge of Aggressive Polio Caused By The Vaccine

Sparked by concerns about a surge of poliomyelitis cases in Nigeria caused by a vaccine-derived strain of type 2 poliovirus, health officials stepped up efforts to curb its spread, according to the Global Polio Vaccine Initiative (http://www.polioeradication.org/content/general/current_monthly_sitrep.asp).

Although type 2 wild poliovirus (1 of the 3 serotypes of wild poliovirus) had been eradicated in 1999, it reemerged a few years ago when weakened type 2 virus in oral polio vaccine mutated. For reasons not well understood, circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus began spreading more aggressively in 2009. By late July, 124 cases of paralysis caused by vaccine-derived virus had been confirmed for 2009, more than 4 times the number of cases confirmed in July 2008.

Source: JAMA. 2009;302(11):1161

98 Cases of Polio: 93 Had SEVEN Doses of Vaccine, 1 Had Three Doses And The Other 4 Cases Were Unknown Status

About 100 new cases of polio have been detected in Bihar till first week of November this year despite the immunisation drives,” a health department official said here Saturday.

Terming it an “alarming” situation, he admitted that it was a setback to the polio immunisation drive in the state.

An official of the state health department said that this year again it was found that children already vaccinated against polio were infected by the disease.

According to latest data, collected under the National Polio Surveillance Programme (NPSP) of the World Health Organisation (WHO), of the 98 cases of poliomyelitis detected in Bihar till Oct 30 this year, 93 children had been administered seven doses of oral polio vaccine (OPV).

One child had been given three doses and the vaccination status of the other four kids is unknown.

Bihar Health Minister Nand Kishore Yadav told IANS here that re-surfacing of new polio cases is posing a big challenge to the government agencies trying to eradicate polio. However, he was optimistic that the disease would be eradicted in the state by 2012.

“It is a matter of serious concern if children are being affected by polio after being administered doses,” Yadav said.

Sources in the Unicef office here said that in Bihar, cases of the P1 and P3 strains were detected.

What is worrying health officials and doctors of the state is that in place of decline, polio cases are showing an increasing trend.

Bihar reported 158 polio cases in 1998 – the year the polio immunisation drive started, 123 in 1999, 49 in 2000, 22 in 2001, 121 in 2002, 18 in 2003, 39 in 2004, 30 in 2005, 61 in 2006 and 193 in 2007. Over 300 new cases were reported in 2008, the highest since the the immunisation drive was launched.

In recent past, health experts expressed concern over rising polio cases in Bihar and fear an outbreak in the state may mar India’s eradication efforts. “Uttar Pradesh and Bihar are two states that were posing a real stumbling block in eradicating polio from India,” another health official said.

India has spent millions of rupees on the immunisation drive to eradicate polio but the ground reality in Bihar shows much remains to be done.

“Though millions were spent on a series of immunisation drives, the battle against polio is far from over in Bihar,” Yadav admitted.

Source: Thaindian News, 7 November 2009.

12 Year Old Girl Gets Polio After Being Vaccinated For ‘Five Years’.

The fourth case of polio reported from Kayamganj area in the district this year has sent health officials into a tizzy and the state government has decided to launch a special programme to check the disease.

Farrukhabad Chief Medical Officer M H Khan said today that after the confirmation of the case in Putti Madari village in Kayamganj a decision has been taken by the government to launch a special programme in 26 districts, including Farrukhabad.

The new case is of a rare kind with the polio virus afflicting a 12-year-old girl who as per the records had been administered the polio drops for five years, the CMO said adding the virus generally afflicts children up to six years of age and therefore the new case has caused alarm in the department.

Source: Press Trust of India, 30 November 2009.

Bedridden and Paralysed For 18 Years Following Polio Vaccination

ON the outskirts of Mufulira in a compound called Kawama East lives 28-year-old Elizabeth Changa who has been lying on a mattress, most of the time face down, for the last 18 years.

The fourth born child of the late Davisnado Changa and Godfreda Katamba, Elizabeth was born and grew up a healthy child till tragedy struck. What was meant to be a routine vaccination for school-going children changed her life forever, leaving her paralysed and unable to do anything.

It all started when a team of medical personnel had gone to administer polio and measles vaccination to the pupils at Kawama Primary School. Little did Elizabeth know that the vaccination injection would change her life forever.

In an interview, Elizabeth shares her 18-year ordeal and how her current situation has left her helpless.

“In 1990, while I was at Kawama Primary School, we were being given polio and measles vaccinations. I felt the usual pain we all feel when given an injection. The next day my left arm where the vaccine was administered was swollen. I developed a sore, which looked like I had been burnt. It was very painful. It (sore) took close to three weeks to heal. As time went by, I lost feeling in my arm and I would drop things every time I was given something to hold,” she explained.

As time passed, both her arms stopped functioning and she eventually lost muscle in both her legs.

“I suddenly started experiencing loss of muscle power on the left arm and with time I could not do things normally; I was unable to hold cups, plates or other items as they kept falling off my hand unintentionally. Later, my right arm stopped functioning as well. Later in the same year, I started limping and had loss of balance due to the developing weakness in both my legs,” Elizabeth said.

Doctors at the hospital could not detect anything, even after conducting tests. they gave her medication but her condition continued deteriorating.

“At this time my condition got worse and I could not do anything. All I could do was sit and crawl. My mother then took me to the clinic but we were referred to Kamuchanga Hospital where they conducted tests but there was nothing in my blood. After undergoing all the necessary tests, doctors still could not find the cause of my problem but warned us that I could develop TB in future. I was not given any medication and was discharged after a week; despite taking this medication my condition continued deteriorating,” she said.

Her mother was advised to take her to Dagama School for the handicapped in Luanshya.
“After being discharged, mother took me to Dagama School for the handicapped in Luanshya but was refused admission without a letter from a church. Later during the year, I was admitted to Kitwe Central Hospital for a week and medical personnel there recommended I seek physiotherapy. Every time I was given medicine, I would bleed profusely. While in hospital, a nurse advised my mother to take me to Chinese doctors as nothing more could be done for me,” she explained.

Life became more difficult and challenging for the family as her father who had earlier been dismissed from ZCCM Mufulira mine decided to separate from his family and left for Lusaka, leaving his seven children in the custody of their unemployed mother.

“We were advised to go to the mine hospital but unfortunately, mother could not afford and we had no relatives working for the mine. Being a single parent, mother got preoccupied with selling charcoal and firewood to help raise money for our upkeep and paying school fees for the other children,” she explained.

In 1998 Elizabeth faced a huge drawback, which left her in the current situation she is, with little or no hope of ever sitting up or walking again.

“My condition got worse as I was not able to do anything. I was confined to bed. I eventually developed bedsores from waist to the legs. At this point I could not even sit, the only thing was to sleep.

The only other time I had visited a hospital was in 2005 when I suffered from malaria and was admitted to Ronald Ross but by then I was already bedridden. Since 1998, I have not been able to do anything. My legs feel heavy and my arms feel dry and lifeless. I answer the call of nature just here (on the mattress),” she lamented.

Elizabeth is bitter with what had happened to her considering she was a healthy child before the tragedy struck but has accepted her situation.

“I am very bitter about the whole thing. I was a normal healthy child who did things every other child my age could do, but now I am in this state. I have accepted that I am disabled but I am not happy because I had to stop school and all my dreams are shattered,” said a visibly emotional Elizabeth.

She appealed to well-wishers to help her get specialists’ treatment with the hope of being able to walk again.

“I pray that someone can help me by paying for my treatment. If that will be too much, maybe help us in any way. It has really been difficult for my mother, especially being a single parent and there are times she finds herself in debt. I believe I will be ok. I would like to go back to school as long as I have the strength,” Elizabeth appealed.

And Elizabeth’s mother Godfreda Katamba said every time she looked at her daughter, it made her cry as she was a perfectly healthy child who’s life had wasted away.

“She was a perfectly healthy child who did everything girls her age could do, but looking at her now makes me cry as her life has just wasted away. I have to do everything for her from feeding her, changing her beddings and bathing her as she has lost control of her bladder and bowels,” she lamented.

Asked on whether she had approached the school authorities concerning her daughter’s condition, she said she had not thought of it at that time.

“I never approached the school after the incident, maybe it was ignorance. I was confused and the only thing that came to my mind was to take her to the hospital for treatment,” she said.

And Dr Gilbert Mukuka who had assessed Elizabeth described her condition as muscular dystrophy a condition associated with muscle wasting.

“She is with some restrictions able to lift her arms but not beyond her shoulders. She cannot hold anything with her hands because of the contractures that have formed on both hands. Her legs are very stiff and cannot be folded on the knee joints or on the ankle,” Dr. Mukuka said.

Source: The Post, by Rebecca Chipanta, 29 November 2009.

Vaccinated Children Spreading Polio to the Unvaccinated

Wild-type poliovirus can be found in the faeces of kids who have received more than 10 doses of the oral vaccine in northern India, say epidemiologists online in the Journal of Infectious Diseases this week. The finding suggests that these kids, who do not fall ill when infected with the virus, may play a part in transmitting the disease to others — and could explain how polio persists in the region despite high levels of vaccination.

The authors of the research, Nicholas Grassly from Imperial College London, UK, and colleagues from the World Health Organization (WHO), say that transmission of the wild poliovirus among vaccinated kids could hamper herd immunity (the protective effect of vaccination on unvaccinated people). New immunisation strategies may be needed to eliminate the disease from India, they add.

Experts say the research provides “good” evidence to confirm a phenomenon reported on numerous occasions over the past 25 years, but which has not been widely accepted by the international community.

Only four countries have not yet put an end to the transmission of wild-type polioviruses: India, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Nigeria. The persistence of the disease in India poses a unique problem to polio eradication programmes as the virus continues to spread in the country even though vaccination coverage is high. In the three other endemic countries the virus persists largely because pockets of people remain unvaccinated, maintaining the spread of the disease.

An oral vaccine against all three strains of the wild-type poliovirus is used to immunise children in India. Scientists have known for some time that kids vaccinated in this way are not fully protected from polioviruses and can still become infected without falling ill. A field investigation into an outbreak of polio in Oman in the late 1980s suggested these vaccinated yet infected kids may help to spread the virus to others. Numerous reports from India have also documented the phenomenon, but until recently the idea has not been acknowledged by the WHO, according to experts EHTF News has contacted.

The researchers launched an investigation to see if vaccinated kids in India are shedding poliovirus in their faeces, which could implicate them in the spread of the virus. They looked for the virus in stool samples, collected during routine diagnosis and surveillance for the disease in India between 2003 and 2008, from suspected polio cases as well as kids with whom they had come into contact. Samples from more than 14,000 healthy kids and over 2700 kids with suspected polio were tested, and 42 cases of polio were confirmed.

At least 13% of the healthy children who came into contact with a laboratory-confirmed case of the polio had detectable wild-type virus in their stool sample, say Grassly and colleagues. This proportion increased to 20% for samples collected within three weeks of polio symptoms first appearing in a confirmed case of the disease. “The majority of healthy contacts who excreted wild-type poliovirus were well vaccinated,” add the authors.

Children in areas at risk of polio are given extra doses of the vaccine to top up their immunity. This is in addition to the four doses given routinely in early childhood. Most kids who took part in the study reported receiving more than 10 doses of the oral vaccine.

These findings are “consistent with a potential role for these children in the asymptomatic transmission of wild-type poliovirus in northern India,” write Grassly and colleagues.

Ellie Ehrenfeld, from the US National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, agrees with this conclusion. There is no question that this plays a part in the spread of polio in India, she says. “The data is absolutely clear.”

Source: Emerging Health Threats Forum, 9 April 2010.

Vaccine Derived Paralytic Polio – 4 out of 5 Cases Died

Researchers from several institutions in Iran reviewed these cases to define the prevalence of vaccine-associated paralytic poliomyelitis. They also aimed to determine whether changing to an inactivated polio vaccine schedule and screening neonates for immunodeficiencies could reduce the risk for infection.

The first patient was a 17-month-old girl who acquired the infection in 1995. She was administered the inactivated polio vaccine due to a known antibody deficiency. She also had a healthy sibling who was administered the oral polio vaccine. Fecal samples indicated vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2. Recombination with the Sabin 1 strain was detected, with a crossover site at nt 5355, according to the results.

The second case occurred in a 7-month-old boy in 2005. He had been administered the oral polio vaccine at birth and at 2, 4 and 6 months. His fecal samples also indicated vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 and recombination with the Sabin 1 strain with a crossover site at nt 5358. He did not have HIV, but the expression of human leukocyte antigen DR on his lymphocytes was low, indicating major histocompatibility complex class II deficiency.

The third patient was a boy who had a variety of health concerns in early 2006 at age 2 months. He was eventually admitted to a hospital with paralytic complications in October 2006. He was also administered the oral polio vaccine at birth and at 2, 4 and 6 months. A number of immunodeficiencies were observed, including decreased CD3+, CD4+ and CD8+ cell counts. Vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 was detected and he was ultimately diagnosed with severe combined immunodeficiency caused by RAG2 mutation.

The fourth patient was a 15-month-old boy given the oral polio vaccine at birth and at 2, 4 and 6 months. Vaccine-derived poliovirus type 3 was isolated from his feces. Recombination with the Sabin 1 strain was detected at the 3Dpol region of the genome.

The fifth patient was a girl born in September 2006. She was given the oral polio vaccine at birth and at 2 months. In February 2007, she was admitted to a hospital with pneumonia and paraparesis, at which point fecal specimen results indicated the presence of vaccine-derived poliovirus types 1 and 2. She was diagnosed with B cell–negative T cell–negative severe combined immunodeficiency.

The final patient was a boy who developed paralysis at 7 months old. An initial fecal specimen indicated the presence of the Sabin 2 strain. After hospitalization for several complications, he was diagnosed with X-linked agammaglobulinemia. Subsequent fecal samples were positive for vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2. Treatment with IV immunoglobulin substitution at 600 mg/kg every four weeks was ongoing. Follow-up fecal samples became negative for polioviruses and his immunodeficiency was under control. Residual paralysis of the right leg remained. He was the only patient who survived.

The median interval between administration of the last oral vaccine dose and onset of vaccine-associated paralytic poliomyelitis was 3.1 months. Immune deficiency was diagnosed after onset of vaccine-associated paralytic poliomyelitis in five of the studied patients.

Along with switching to an inactivated polio vaccine schedule, the researchers also recommended screening children for immunodeficiencies.

Source: Shahmahmoodi S, Mamishi S, Aghamohammadi A, Aghazadeh N, Tabatabaie H, Goya MM, et al. Vaccine-associated paralytic poliomyelitis in immunodeficient children, Iran, 1995–2008. Emerg Infect Dis. 2010 Jul; [Epub ahead of print]

http://www.cdc.gov/eid/content/16/7/pdfs/09-1606.pdf

 78% of Polio Cases are in Vaccinated People

The health authorities have discovered that more than 78 per cent of confirmed polio cases in Pakistan involved children who had been administered polio drops.

According to a report compiled by polio eradication section of the National Institute of Health, out of 136 polio cases reported this year, 107 children had been administered polio drops on several occasions under a prescribed schedule.

The data available on the website of the World Health Organisation also indicated that Pakistan had registered the highest number of polio cases in a decade this year.

Officials in the National Polio Control Programme said that the number of polio cases had increased during the last three years after going down for the previous seven years.

They suspected that the vaccine might have lost its efficacy after not having been stored at the required temperature, especially in far-flung areas where electricity supply is disrupted for long hours.

Prof Athar Niaz Rana, head of allergy and immunology department at the Shifa International Hospital, told Dawn: “Vaccine failure and failure to vaccinate are two important factors which have affected the national polio campaign.”

He insisted that “security situation in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa is also one of the factors which has led to the failure of vaccine in that region.”

Dr Rana pointed out that “the problem of vaccine storage in areas where refrigeration facilities are not available or power supply is discontinued very frequently also affects the efficacy of polio vaccine”.

A health ministry official told Dawn: “It is a WHO-tested vaccine and we have no doubt about its efficacy, although we have a few issues at the district level related to management.”

He said the vaccine was not being used in Pakistan alone but also in several other countries.

“A surge in polio cases in a few areas is because of security reasons and the ministry has developed a comprehensive plan for 2011 to meet the challenge.”

Source: Dawn.com, 22nd December 2010 – http://www.dawn.com/2010/12/22/incidence-of-polio-among-vaccinated-children-alarms-govt.html

Three Outbreaks of Vaccine Caused Polio Demonstrates Need for Vaccine…Say What!?!

Three new outbreaks of circulating vaccine-derived polioviruses were identified and three previously identified outbreaks continued through late 2010 or into 2011. These new outbreaks highlight the importance of trivalent oral poliovirus vaccination campaigns to prevent both wild-type and vaccine-derived poliovirus outbreaks, according to the CDC.

The three new outbreaks of circulating VDPVs (cVDPVs) ranged in size from six to 16 cases and were reported in Afghanistan, Ethiopia and India. The previously reported outbreaks in Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Somalia continued through late 2010 or into 2011 and resulted in a total of 405 cases. In addition, two countries experienced importations of cVDPVs from Nigeria, and nine people living in seven middle-income and developing countries who were newly identified as paralyzed were found to excrete VDPVs. VDPVs were also found among people and environmental samples in 15 countries. The emerging cVDPVs were type 2 in all but one country, according to a report in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

Source: Pediatric Supersite, 5th July 2011 –
http://www.pediatricsupersite.com/view.aspx?rid=85302

Vaccine-Derived Poliomyelitis 12 Years after Infection

DeVries et al. (June 16 issue)1 describe a patient with vaccine-derived poliomyelitis. We were unable to clear chronic, asymptomatic, neurovirulent poliovirus infection in a similarly antibody-deficient patient despite the use of antiviral therapy, breast milk, and oral immune globulin.2 In our patient, the mean IgG trough levels were 1000 mg per deciliter, and paralysis did not develop during an estimated 29 years of poliovirus infection. Neutralizing antibodies against his own poliovirus isolates were detected in his replacement immune globulin by the National Institute for Biological Standards and Control.3 In the patient described by DeVries et al., the IgG trough levels were 438 and 648 mg per deciliter before the onset of paralysis, and the immune globulin–replacement product had recently been changed. Since immunity to enteroviruses is primarily antibody-mediated,4 adequate immune globulin replacement is key for the prevention of paralysis in immunodeficient poliovirus carriers. Where possible, replacement immune globulin should be tested for antiviral activity against poliovirus isolates from such carriers until new antiviral agents that can cure this condition are available.5

Source: N Engl J Med 2011; 365:1355October 6, 2011.

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc1108814

Child vaccinated for Polio ‘stops walking’

Islamabad – Another ‘suspected’ case of polio reported in a Pakistani child who was vaccinated for polio. Perhaps it’s time to raise a very important question.
There was hardly any more appropriate way than to quote verbatim, in the title above, what the latest media report published about a Pakistani child who was vaccinated and still developed what sounds like paralysis. Now what do we call this policy of Pakistani media– subtlety of expression, or reluctance to highlight threats?
As readers may spot in the report, a child from Islamabad was vaccinated for polio, and he never missed a dose as the vaccination program requires. But he has developed a disability which is suspected to be polio. While we should praise this particular paper for at least reporting the case, the reporting has been stripped of all the suspicion that gives a reader a critical glimpse of the situation. We don’t miss noting that the report excludes all details of what actually happened to the child. He is said to have ‘stopped walking’. Sounds like the word ‘paralysis’ is too scary for the masses most of whom still do not know about the life-threatening and life-crippling effects of the orally administered polio vaccine – one that was banned in the US more than 10 years ago, and banned in Europe more than 25 years ago.
The tests of the child have been sent to the NIH lab, which, as the news report notes, is the only
one across the entire country that can medially verify a polio case. A single lab in the entire country of 180 million people for testing a polio case! Does that not sound like a joke? Well, perhaps it is. No wonder that polio cases are ‘on decline’ as some claim in this country. But are they?
Let’s look at some of the news links where Pakistan’s truth-shy media dared to report on cases of paralysis or even death among children vaccinated for polio:
• December 2010: Incidence of polio among children vaccinated under the polio eradication program rises and causes concern for the government.
• June 2011: An infant hardly 2 weeks young died in Naseerabad (Punjab) soon after polio vaccine was administered to her. The parents blamed the vaccine for the death. But, as expected, the local administration declared it as natural death.
• November 2011: A 5-year-old child in Faisalabad (Punjab) died after becoming paralyzed neck-down just a few days after polio drops were sent down her throat. The child started complaining of pain in her limbs immediately after receiving the drops, soon starting to scream out of pain. The bereaved parents protest and blame the polio vaccine for the child’s death; their cries are ignored.
• Of 4 reported polio cases, three children in Pakistan’s Sindh and Punjab provinces were those vaccinated for the disease – Source: Measles Initiative
• February 2012: Two kids in Sindh crippled for life; the children’s father blames the polio vaccine for the calamity and demands for a probe; as usual, the curtains drop over the cases.
A number of other links are there online about disparate cases of polio and DEATH occurring immediately or soon after the administration of the polio drops. In some cases, media create the excuse of ‘expired vaccines’ causing the damage; sometimes it is ‘improper’ or ‘careless’ administration of the drops; and sometimes just ‘suspected’ cases of polio happening after the vaccination. But no one dares ask the question: why a vaccine version that is banned in the developed world given to millions of children in the third world?

Source: Digital Journal, 21st May 2012 – http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/325249

Up to 180 Indian Children Get Polio From the Vaccine Every Year – While There Has Been No Wild Polio For a Year. Benefits Outweigh the Risks??

India’s health ministry, celebrating a year of freedom from wild polio, now faces a dilemma that public health experts had predicted years ago: the very vaccine it is using to fight polio is causing more polio paralysis than the wild poliovirus.

India observed last Thursday as a milestone, marking a full year without polio caused by a wild poliovirus.

But surveillance data show that last year, seven children in India developed polio from vaccine-derived poliovirus (VDPV), the medical term for a virus from the oral polio vaccine (OPV) that has regained the ability to cause disease.

Such infections occur when virus from the OPV, after being excreted by vaccinated children, regains neuro-virulence and the ability to circulate in the environment and strikes other vulnerable children.

Public health experts also estimate that between 100 and 180 children in India develop vaccine-associated polio paralysis (VAPP) each year, a rare but serious side effect of the OPV they had received to protect them from the wild poliovirus. As opposed to VDPV infection, VAPP affects the vaccinated children themselves.

Source: The Telegraph, India.  15th January 2012.  http://www.telegraphindia.com/1120116/jsp/frontpage/story_15011108.jsp#.T9pjWFJ9xD0

Polio programme: let us declare victory and move on

It was hoped that following polio eradication, immunisation could be stopped. However the synthesis of polio virus in 2002, made eradication impossible. It is argued that getting poor countries to expend their scarce resources on an impossible dream over the last 10 years was unethical. Furthermore, while India has been polio-free for a year, there has been a huge increase in non-polio acute flaccid paralysis (NPAFP). In 2011, there were an extra 47,500 new cases of NPAFP. Clinically indistinguishable from polio paralysis but twice as deadly, the incidence of NPAFP was directly proportional to doses of oral polio received. Though this data was collected within the polio surveillance system, it was not investigated. The principle of primum-non-nocere was violated. The authors suggest that the huge bill of US$ 8 billion spent on the programme, is a small sum to pay if the world learns to be wary of such vertical programmes in the future.

Source: Indian J Med Ethics. 2012 Apr-Jun;9(2):114-7.  http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22591873

Non-polio acute flaccid paralysis is what they have named polio that occurs after the vaccine, it is exactly the same as normal polio but kills at a much higher rate, so the oral polio vaccine campaigns are killing people.

 Paralysis cases soar after oral polio vaccine introduced

“From 1980 through 1999, there were 162 confirmed cases of paralytic polio reported. Of the 162 cases, eight cases were acquired outside the United States and imported… The remaining 154 cases were vaccine-associated paralytic polio (VAPP) caused by live oral poliovirus vaccine (OPV).” The debilitating – and sometimes deadly – side effects of the oral polio vaccine led the U.S. to stop using it in 2000, the New York Times reported. However, many governments around the world still administer the dangerous vaccine to their citizens. Despite the grave concerns that have been raised, the vaccine manufacturers and the health agencies they have partnered with around the world are shifting the oral polio vaccination effort into high gear – and there are no signs of stopping.

Vaccination Kills Sick Children

The Zimbabwe government has begun an investigation into reports of severe adverse effects – including deaths – from an immunization program against polio and measles it conducted last month.

Zimbabwean Health Minister Henry Madzorera attributed the negative physical reactions some children have to vaccinations to malnutrition, among other factors. He also said the children may already have other diseases when they get vaccinated.

“Zimbabwe has among the highest maternal and child death rates in the world,” said Madzorera. “So some events are coincidental due to the high frequency of child deaths, but also child morbidity. However, vaccination remains a key intervention in giving a child a chance of life. But the frequency and magnitude of adverse events becomes higher on these children who are already sick.”

In Zimbabwe, vaccination of children has in the past met with resistance from some parents, who say their children became ill after getting the shots.

The June vaccination program sponsored by the United Nations children’s agency (UNICEF) and Japan drew attention when a child died in Masvingo, about 300 kilometers south of Harare.

Deputy Health Minister Douglas Mombeshora confirmed the death and suggested other factors, not just the vaccination, may have caused the death.

“The child was severely malnourished,” said Mombeshora. “We also discovered that the parents were on ART [AIDS] therapy. The parents had not come to say they are on treatment. That they are on treatment and the low weight on the child [was] mostly likely [because] the child was HIV positive.”

Source: The Journal of Turkish Weekly, 21st July 2012.

VAN UK’s Comment: Other epidemiologists in the third world have stated that vaccinating malnourished children can be fatal and Dr. Kalokerinos already discovered in the 70’s that DPT killed malnourished tribal children, yet they still don’t learn.

Researchers Track Polio-Like Illness in Vaccinated Children

See this link:

http://med.stanford.edu/ism/2014/march/polio-0310.html

Circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 – Syrian Arab Republic

A circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 (cVDPV2) outbreak has been confirmed in the Deir Al Zour Governorate of the Syrian Arab Republic. There is evidence of genetic linkage among three isolates of type-2 vaccine-derived polioviruses (VDPV2) isolated in the stool specimens of two acute flaccid paralysis (AFP) cases with dates of onset of paralysis on 5 March and 6 May 2017, and the contact specimen of an AFP case collected on 17 April 2017. Al Mayadeen was also the epi-centre of the wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) outbreak in Syrian Arab Republic in 2013. Aggressive multi-country polio outbreak response effectively controlled the WPV1 outbreak and no WPV1 case has been reported in Syrian Arab Republic since 21 January 2014.

Public health response

Since the confirmation of the first VDPV2 during May 2017, AFP surveillance has been intensified in the Governorate, especially in the Al Mayadeen district. As of 6 June 2017, a total of 58 AFP cases have been reported from the Governorate this year. In addition to the two cases that have tested positive for VDPV2, a further 11 have tested negative for polioviruses, with the remaining samples being under process in the laboratories or being transported to the laboratories.

Subsequent to the confirmation of the cVDPV2 outbreak, outbreak response planning is underway, including planning for supplementary immunization activities (SIAs) with monovalent oral polio vaccine type 2 (mOPV2), in line with internationally-agreed outbreak response protocols.

Source: http://www.who.int/csr/don/13-June-2017-polio-syrian-arab-republic/en/

Vaccine-derived polio cases reported in Syria