Rotary Club International (RCI) has called on mothers, schools, and religious organisations to remain open to the vaccination of their children against polio.

The organisation made the call during its ‘Kick out Polio to Zero’ campaign, which was part of the organisation’s activities to mark this year’s World Polio Day.

Marked every 24 October, the World Polio Day highlights global efforts made towards a polio-free world, honouring the contributions of frontline workers in the fight to eradicate the disease from the world.

Although Nigeria is polio-free, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO), the Chairman of the Edo State Polio Plus Representative, Oyaseh Ivowi, believes that the fight against the disease must continue until the entire world is polio-free.

The disease has been curtailed globally except in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

‘We will not rest on our oars and we will continue to make sure that polio is at zero in Nigeria. We will cooperate with the rest of the world to ensure polio-free’, Ivowi said in Benin, the Edo State capital.

‘The main fight against polio is immunisation so we have to continue to immunise until the world is polio-free because it is transferable. Let us continue to immunise’.

Also speaking, WHO Cluster Consultant, Winnie Aigbojie, said that some mothers were denying their children immunisation.

‘During the last polio immunisation exercise, many mothers refused to bring their children out for vaccination’, Aigbojie lamented.

‘Our mothers should ensure that all children from zero to five years are immunised against polio. The exercise is the normal polio vaccine that we are still giving to children so they should ensure that they bring their children forward to take it.

‘School teachers should also endeavour to allow our teams to vaccinate children in schools. Same thing to the clergy in churches. We have been doing this before, and it has not changed because we want to keep polio at zero’.

Source: This Day

Photo source: UNICEF Ethiopia