The World Health Organization (WHO) stressed on Monday the need not to be wary as cases of covid-19 and flu increase in Europe with winter approaching.
On World Polio Day, the WHO cited the example of polio to justify the usefulness of vaccination.
“This is not the time to relax,” WHO Director-General for Europe, Hans Kluge, said during an online press conference.
At the beginning of autumn, the European region, which brings together 53 countries, including some in Central Asia, is once again the epicenter of the epidemic, accounting for 60% of the world’s Covid-19 cases.
At the same time, a peak in seasonal flu cases was recorded.
With this new wave of Covid-19, the number of deaths and hospitalizations in intensive care is only increasing slightly, the same source said, underscoring the relationship with vaccination.
“Vaccination remains one of the most effective mechanisms against flu and Covid-19,” he added.
This disease, which mainly affects children and causes paralysis, has almost disappeared from the western world, but a variant of the polio virus derived from oral vaccines has recently been discovered in the United Kingdom, Ukraine, Israel and New York.
This variant is more virulent than the natural virus and can even cause severe symptoms, such as paralysis of limbs, in unvaccinated patients.
Rare, this variant has further developed in recent years due to poor vaccination coverage in some communities.
“If we leave people all over the world, the polio virus is a very good barometer to tell us who they are,” said WHO Europe expert Siddhartha Datta. “These are disadvantaged populations, which for some reason were not covered by the WHO recommendation for 95% (vaccination) coverage.”
No case of natural polio virus has been reported in Europe for more than 20 years.
“It’s not something we can take for granted,” Kluge defended.
Across the region, coverage for the third dose of polio vaccines fell by 1% between 2019 and 2020. In 2021, only 25 of 53 countries had polio vaccinations of around 95%.
Source: DN
