Bob and Kathy when with an organized Rotary group to India in 2012 to participate and help immunize children under 5 years old from Polio. They were just two in many thousands of volunteers and groups, both from Indian and abroad who do this every year. Bob and Kathy were part of a team of 38 Foreign delegates, 7 Canadians and the rest from the US. The 7 Canadians included Bob and Kathy, Mark and Valarie Wafer, another couple a person from out west. They have remained in contact since 2012.

 

Their team was based in New Delhi and conducted the immunization in a smaller town of Sanipat near New Delhi. They were welcomed and found India very friendly with beautiful structures. They visited some lesser known temples that were quiet and not busy, but also the Taj Ma Hall that is very popular and busy.

 

There is a dramatic contrast to how many live, particularly in rural India. They use whatever they can find as building materials.

 

Market areas in City busy and crowded. Garbage everywhere and open sewers.

 

Traffic- there are no rules. Drive, walk, peddle and fit in any space you think you can occupy. From camels pulling carts to modern and new vehicles. Side mirrors are either turned in or broken.

 

The people are friendly, clean and dress well.

 

Rotary has a great name in India. Mothers would hand over their babies to a stranger like Bob wearing Rotary clothing. No hesitation.

 

They visited Rotary pop up health clinics, on the street. Pharmacy would be in back, also open to street. Always crowded as people came to get service. The people were quiet and behaved, waiting their turn in line.

 

They attended a Rotary Blood Bank, very much like a blood bank in Canada. Although in India they also process the blood at the same location.

 

Rotary also brings people from rural areas into the City for medical treatments / surgery. They also do corrective surgery for people with Polio to help them stand more upright.

 

Bob said there were Polio victims everywhere on the streets. Not hard to find. They are called 'crawlers' with little use of their legs.

 

Then the National Immunization Day (NID). Their goal to vaccinate all children under 5 with two drops of the oral vaccine. The kids are marked with purple marker on their little finger to indicate who has been vaccinated. 'Purple pinkie'. The dye wears off with time.

 

After the first day they spent couple days going door to door looking for kids missed. The first day families come to clinic and line up to be vaccinated. There are always a local health care worker with them to interpret and record.

 

There were 1,500,000 people in their District for NID. About 213,218 children to be vaccinated. There were 759 teams in their district.

Day 1 they immunized 154,663

Day 2 knocking on doors 49,141 immunized

Day 3 knocking on doors 23,465 immunized

 

In the Country on the day there were 800,000 vaccine booths with 2.3 million volunteers. 1.2 million teams and 170 million children vaccinated.

 

This whole program started with a Global Grant in the 1970's by local Rotary with idea to vaccinate people in Phillipines. Small Pox had been eliminated and the WHO considered Polio as a possibility, especially with success in Phillipines. So as a combination of Rotary, Unicef, WHO and CDC the eradication of Polio began about 1988. Canada was one of first Countries to sign one and help pay, the US government has been a huge support and more recently the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation who pass all their support through Rotary.

 

In 1993 there were 2 million new cases of Polio a year. In 2021 there have only been 2, one in Pakistan and one in Afghanistan.

 

Bob is a volunteer at the COVID vaccine clinic in Cobourg set up and organized by Rotary. He sees parrallels with the immunization in India for Polio. There are about 600 volunteers in Cobourg and people are eager to volunteer for the social interaction.

 

Babies in Canada are still vaccinated for Polio.

 

People with polio carry the virus. People get it from water. It will still take time to eliminate Polio. In some areas the people are very transient and difficult to get to all. But someday soon.