AMAZING-‘Nigeria recorded no polio case in seven months’

Nigeria’s march towards being certified as polio free country may soon be realised as no single case has been recorded in the past seven months.

It therefore means that if the status quo is maintained for the next five months, by July this year, Nigeria will be delisted from polio endemic countries.
Supervising Minister and Minister of State for Health, Dr Khaliru Alhassan, disclosed this to journalists in Abuja, on Saturday, while reacting to a publication credited to one Dr. Tunji Funsho, on the polio situation in Nigeria.
While faulting Funsho’s claim, the minister regretted that he (Funsho), while commenting on the polio situation, failed to make reference to the unprecedented progress on polio eradication by the current administration of  President Goodluck Jonathan.
According to Alhassan: “Nigeria has recorded giant strides in its polio efforts and there is no gainsaying the fact that Nigeria has the capacity to eradicate polio, as no case of the disease has been reported in the southern part of the country for five years.
“With the exception of some cases in Kano and Yobe states, no polio virus infection has been reported in the past two years in the Northern states.
“It is also pertinent to note, that for seven months now, Nigeria has not recorded any case of polio in any part of the federation.”