The U.N. health agency downplayed fears of a major polio outbreak in Saudi Arabia fueled by Islamic pilgrims from African nations still in the grip of the disease. Saudi authorities have reported three cases of polio, including one this week in a boy from Nigeria, where a vaccine boycott by hardline Muslim clerics in the country's north spawned a resurgence of the disease across Africa, infecting children in formerly polio-free nations. "This isn't a major setback," said Bruce Aylward, who coordinates the World Health Organization's anti-polio initiative. | "I prefer to look at it as job security." |
The WHO also said it was on track in its worldwide campaign to eradicate the crippling and sometimes fatal disease. Saudi authorities regularly run vaccination programs ahead of the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, which draws faithful Muslims from around the world. A handful of polio cases should not raise fears of a looming outbreak there, WHO officials said. |