SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
Humanitarian Crisis in Syria Spirals With Confirmed Cases of Polio
Paralyzed children collateral damage of ongoing conflict
Oct 29, 2013
In another sign of the massive humanitarian crisis spiraling in Syria, the World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed on Tuesday 10 cases of polio--the first outbreak of the disease in the country in 14 years--and warned that the risk of the disease spreading was high.
The world health body stated that most of the cases of the highly contagious, crippling and potentially deadly disease were in children under 2 who were either not immunized or were under-immunized.
Another 12 cases of paralysis the WHO documented in the country's eastern province of Deir Al Zour are still being investigated to confirm if they were caused by polio as well.
Oliver Rosenbauer, spokesman of the WHO polio eradication program, told Reuters that "immunizations have started in that area."
The WHO estimates that the immunization rate in the country was just 68% in 2012, a drop from 91% just two years earlier.
"Of course this is a communicable disease, with population movements it can travel to other areas. So the risk is high for (its) spread across the region," Rosenbauer told a news conference.
Over two million Syrians have been forced to become refugees, fleeing to neighboring countries including Lebanon, Turkey and Iraq, and the UN fears that number could reach as high as five million by 2015. There are also currently 5 million internally displaced Syrians--refugees in their own country.
Ahead of the confirmation of the polio cases by the WHO, UNICEF announced plans for a large-scale immunization effort to target the 500,000 children in Syria that the last two years of fighting and insecurity have left vulnerable to polio and other preventable diseases.
Last week, UNICEF stated, "The conflict in Syria has caused immense displacement, with millions of children on the move, either inside the country or across borders into neighboring countries and beyond. As a result, routine immunization systems so critical to preventing childhood diseases have been disrupted or broken down, and children are now at far higher risk of diseases such as polio and measles."
Carolyn Miles, president and CEO of the international children's charity Save the Children, said the cases of polio were "another sign of the desperate and spiraling humanitarian situation" in Syria and demand "vaccination ceasefires." She added, "If chemical weapons inspectors can be allowed access across Syria with notebooks, surely aid workers can be allowed in with vaccines."
"Anytime you have half a million or more children who have not been reached with lifesaving vaccinations," UNICEF Executive Director Anthony Lake told the Associated Press, "then it is very urgent that you be able to get in to vaccinate them."
___________________
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
In another sign of the massive humanitarian crisis spiraling in Syria, the World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed on Tuesday 10 cases of polio--the first outbreak of the disease in the country in 14 years--and warned that the risk of the disease spreading was high.
The world health body stated that most of the cases of the highly contagious, crippling and potentially deadly disease were in children under 2 who were either not immunized or were under-immunized.
Another 12 cases of paralysis the WHO documented in the country's eastern province of Deir Al Zour are still being investigated to confirm if they were caused by polio as well.
Oliver Rosenbauer, spokesman of the WHO polio eradication program, told Reuters that "immunizations have started in that area."
The WHO estimates that the immunization rate in the country was just 68% in 2012, a drop from 91% just two years earlier.
"Of course this is a communicable disease, with population movements it can travel to other areas. So the risk is high for (its) spread across the region," Rosenbauer told a news conference.
Over two million Syrians have been forced to become refugees, fleeing to neighboring countries including Lebanon, Turkey and Iraq, and the UN fears that number could reach as high as five million by 2015. There are also currently 5 million internally displaced Syrians--refugees in their own country.
Ahead of the confirmation of the polio cases by the WHO, UNICEF announced plans for a large-scale immunization effort to target the 500,000 children in Syria that the last two years of fighting and insecurity have left vulnerable to polio and other preventable diseases.
Last week, UNICEF stated, "The conflict in Syria has caused immense displacement, with millions of children on the move, either inside the country or across borders into neighboring countries and beyond. As a result, routine immunization systems so critical to preventing childhood diseases have been disrupted or broken down, and children are now at far higher risk of diseases such as polio and measles."
Carolyn Miles, president and CEO of the international children's charity Save the Children, said the cases of polio were "another sign of the desperate and spiraling humanitarian situation" in Syria and demand "vaccination ceasefires." She added, "If chemical weapons inspectors can be allowed access across Syria with notebooks, surely aid workers can be allowed in with vaccines."
"Anytime you have half a million or more children who have not been reached with lifesaving vaccinations," UNICEF Executive Director Anthony Lake told the Associated Press, "then it is very urgent that you be able to get in to vaccinate them."
___________________
In another sign of the massive humanitarian crisis spiraling in Syria, the World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed on Tuesday 10 cases of polio--the first outbreak of the disease in the country in 14 years--and warned that the risk of the disease spreading was high.
The world health body stated that most of the cases of the highly contagious, crippling and potentially deadly disease were in children under 2 who were either not immunized or were under-immunized.
Another 12 cases of paralysis the WHO documented in the country's eastern province of Deir Al Zour are still being investigated to confirm if they were caused by polio as well.
Oliver Rosenbauer, spokesman of the WHO polio eradication program, told Reuters that "immunizations have started in that area."
The WHO estimates that the immunization rate in the country was just 68% in 2012, a drop from 91% just two years earlier.
"Of course this is a communicable disease, with population movements it can travel to other areas. So the risk is high for (its) spread across the region," Rosenbauer told a news conference.
Over two million Syrians have been forced to become refugees, fleeing to neighboring countries including Lebanon, Turkey and Iraq, and the UN fears that number could reach as high as five million by 2015. There are also currently 5 million internally displaced Syrians--refugees in their own country.
Ahead of the confirmation of the polio cases by the WHO, UNICEF announced plans for a large-scale immunization effort to target the 500,000 children in Syria that the last two years of fighting and insecurity have left vulnerable to polio and other preventable diseases.
Last week, UNICEF stated, "The conflict in Syria has caused immense displacement, with millions of children on the move, either inside the country or across borders into neighboring countries and beyond. As a result, routine immunization systems so critical to preventing childhood diseases have been disrupted or broken down, and children are now at far higher risk of diseases such as polio and measles."
Carolyn Miles, president and CEO of the international children's charity Save the Children, said the cases of polio were "another sign of the desperate and spiraling humanitarian situation" in Syria and demand "vaccination ceasefires." She added, "If chemical weapons inspectors can be allowed access across Syria with notebooks, surely aid workers can be allowed in with vaccines."
"Anytime you have half a million or more children who have not been reached with lifesaving vaccinations," UNICEF Executive Director Anthony Lake told the Associated Press, "then it is very urgent that you be able to get in to vaccinate them."
___________________
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.