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posted by janrinok on Wednesday August 17 2016, @07:11PM   Printer-friendly
from the we-CAN-blame-the-terrorists dept.

The government of Nigeria today launched a massive vaccination campaign in the northern state of Borno in response to news that two children there had been paralyzed by wild-type polio virus. [...] Much of Borno is under control of the ruthless terrorist group Boko Haram, vaccinators have been unable to reach hundreds of thousands of children, and the insurgency has disrupted surveillance for the virus, which appears to have been circulating undetected for years.

[...] CDC scientists quickly sequenced viral isolates from the two cases. Both viruses are closely related to one last seen in Borno in 2011, suggesting that polio has been circulating undetected there for 5 years.

Based on the small percent of polio infections that result in paralytic disease, the estimated number of people infected with poliovirus in the region would be between 200-2000.

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/08/polio-reappears-nigeria-triggering-massive-response
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poliomyelitis#Signs_and_symptoms


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 18 2016, @07:19AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 18 2016, @07:19AM (#389512)

    Original AC here.

    I meant introduction to West Africa, and in particular Nigeria, not as a concept. Obviously, the ancient Egyptians had slavery
    at the time of Moses, , and it was not new then, although it is generally agreed the pyramids were not built by slaves
    - on account of finding payroll records for some of the workers (on clay tables, not punched cards).