India recently celebrated a year of being polio-free. This is a remarkable achievement in a country that until recently was recognized as the world’s epicenter of polio. India’s momentous accomplishment is boosting prospects of polio becoming only the second disease after smallpox to have been eradicated. To ensure that it remains polio-free, India is holding a second round of National Immunization Days. Between February 19 and 25, vaccinators aim to immunize 172 million children against polio.
印度最近庆祝全国整整一年没有出现新的小儿麻痹症病例。对于印度这个直到最近还是全世界小儿麻痹症发病率最高的这么一个国家来说，这实在可以说是一个相当大的成就。为了确保全国各地保持没有小儿麻痹症的出现，印度展开了第二轮全国免疫日活动。在2月19号到25号这期间，当地的免疫人员将为全国各地一亿七千两百万儿童注射小儿麻痹症的疫苗。
Staff Benda Bilili, a group of eight former street musicians from Kinshasa, Congo, are singing their signature song "Polio." Four of the musicians are disabled polio victims. They sing about the disease that drastically changed their lives. They urge parents to immunize their children. They travel throughout Africa on a mission to kick polio out of the continent.
Sona Bari is external relations officer for the World Health Organization’s Global Polio Eradication Initiative. She said, "A year has passed in which no child in India has been paralyzed by polio for the first time in history."
素纳·伯瑞是世界卫生组织负责在全球范围内彻底消除小儿麻痹症的项目官员之一。她说：“在印度，过去一年来，没有一个孩子因为小儿麻痹症而瘫痪，这可以说是史无前例的。”
She says India has always been considered the toughest place on earth to stop the virus. But she notes it has achieved this milestone through political will, huge funding by Rotary International, and determination and persistence by the whole society.
她说，印度一向被认为是全世界范围内最不容易消除小儿麻痹症的一个国家。这位专家指出，印度之所以做到了根除小儿麻痹症，很大程度上是因为印度政府下定决心要将这一疾病彻底根除，而且来自国际社会的基金也起到了相当的作用，再加上印度全社会上下都展示了决心和恒心。
"India and Indians had to be committed for a decade to month after month of vaccination activities," said Bari. "House to house to vaccinate children, keeping surveillance for polio very high and finding the most remote and inaccessible populations to ensure that every last child was reached."
她说：“印度全国上下过去十年来，一直不断进行疫苗播种工作，一家也不错过，而且一直保持着高度的警惕性，确保每一个孩子、包括那些住在非常偏僻地带的孩子，都被接种疫苗。”
Now that India has stopped the transmission of the wild poliovirus, only three polio endemic countries remain - Nigeria, Pakistan and Afghanistan.
如今印度已经不再有小儿麻痹症患者了，但在尼日利亚、巴基斯坦和阿富汗，小儿麻痹症还没有根除。
Bruce Aylward is WHO assistant director for polio, emergencies and country collaboration. He said the "main challenge and problems are definitely right now going to be in northern Nigeria and Pakistan."
布鲁斯·艾尔沃德是世界卫生组织负责协调小儿麻痹症、突发状况、以及国与国之间合作的一位官员。
"Basically, the whole 20-year, 10-plus-billion-dollar effort now hinges on how well some district or local government area leaders are in vaccinating their kids, and probably what would amount to somewhere around 40 or 50 districts in the entire world. It really is now coming down to that with the progress recently made in India," said Aylward.
他说：“基本上，从印度的经验来看，今后20年、一百多亿美元的项目是否成功，就看地方官员能够在多大程度上把接种疫苗这件事做好了。世界范围内现在差不多还有四、五十个地区需要消灭小儿麻痹症。”
In 2003, religious and political leaders in Kano, Nigeria, claimed the polio vaccine was part of a Western conspiracy to sterilize girls. Immunizations stopped. As a consequence, hundreds of Nigerian children became disabled and the virus spread to neighboring countries.
2003年，尼日利亚卡诺地区的宗教以及政界领导人物声称小儿麻痹症疫苗是西方国家想要让非洲的女童失去生育能力的疫苗。当地政府那么说以后，疫苗的接种工作就停止了。结果数百名尼日利亚儿童染上了小儿麻痹症。这一病毒还传染到了附近的邻国。
Bruce Aylward says both governments and health providers have learned from this experience. All are more vigilant, and great pains are being taken to make sure communities understand the importance of immunizing their children against this dreadful disease.
世界卫生组织的布鲁斯·艾尔沃德说，各国政府以及卫生保健人员都从那一事件中学到了很多东西。从那以来，各方都更加不放松了，而且也都更加注意让人充份了解给孩子接种疫苗的重要性。
"It is a horrific, painful, devastating disease for the child, often for the family and then often even for the communities…Once polio is eliminated, we will also eliminate an incredible barrier to development, an incredible barrier to productivity for not just countries, but obviously the communities that are affected by polio and the children that are affected by polio," Aylward said.
艾尔沃德说：“对孩子们来说，小儿麻痹症是一个非常可怕的、带来很多痛苦、让人几乎无法承受的一种疾病，对患病的孩子的全家、以致整个社区来说，往往都难以承受。一旦小儿麻痹症被消除以后，一个地区向前发展的障碍也同时被扫除了。要不然的话，这一障碍不仅对国家，对社区、家庭、和孩子本身来说，也都是非常严重的。”
When WHO launched its Global Polio Eradication Initiative in 1988, 350,000 children were paralyzed or killed by this crippling disease every year. That number fell to 647 cases in 17 countries last year. WHO estimates about $10 billion has been spent on polio eradication so far. The United Nations agency says the world stands to benefit by $40 billion to $50 billion in net health savings 20 years after transmission is stopped.
世界卫生组织1988年启动了彻底扫除小儿麻痹症的项目。之前，世界范围内，每年都有大约35万个孩子由于患有这一病患，或是瘫痪，或是面临着死亡。去年，由于小儿麻痹症而瘫痪或死亡的儿童，只有647个，而且仅限于17个国家。世界卫生组织估计，到目前为止，各方面已经注入了100亿美元的资金，用来消除小儿麻痹症。世卫组织说，小儿麻痹症一旦彻底停止传播，20年之后，世界各国将能够省下400到500亿美元的相关医疗费用。
For United Nations Children's Fund Senior Health Specialist Brigitte Toure, the question is not one of if the job can get done, but when. "The big achievement of India in one year is to have demonstrated that it is possible to stop polio," she said. "You know that in the world, 99 percent of the countries have stopped polio…We are confident that we will stop this polio outbreak, but we have to work."
对于联合国儿童基金的资深卫生事务官员布里吉特·图尔来说，问题不是要不要达到这一目标，而是什么时候能够达到这一目标。图尔说：“印度在一年之内所取得的显著的成绩表明，要彻底扫除小儿麻痹症是可以做到的。现在世界上99%的国家，都已经消灭小儿麻痹症了。我们有信心，小儿麻痹症最终能够被彻底铲除，但是得要做大量的工作。”
India’s achievement is converting skeptics into believers. The results are there for all to see. India shows polio can be eradicated if the political commitment and the money are there to bring this dreaded disease to an end.
印度取得的成绩让过去很多对此抱有怀疑态度的人如今都有了信心。印度的成绩是有目共睹的；他们展示了如果政府决心消除小儿麻痹症、而且资金到位的话，目标是能够达到的。
Campaign supporters argue that too much has been invested in the polio eradication initiative to abandon it. They warn the consequences of failure are too terrible to contemplate. They say the world, once again, would be faced with hundreds of thousands of children becoming paralyzed or dying from this horrific, but preventable, disease.
全球各地支持扫除小儿麻痹症的人士说，目前在这个领域的投入已经很大，不能够轻易放弃。他们还警告说，要放弃的话，后果不堪设想。 |