Uganda still under threat of polio: WHO

Uganda is still under the threat of polio transmission although it had been free of the virus since 1996, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said.

The WHO said in a statement that the active disease surveillance in Uganda had been strengthened but was still not strong enough to detect polio in order to stop an epidemic.

The WHO said Uganda stood the risk of importing polio from Angola, after a fresh polio case was confirmed in the capital Luanda.

"Uganda is no exception, since the Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV) coverage, which stands at 90 percent, has still not reach the required level to halt polio virus transmission," the statement said.

"Only 33 out of 56 districts have achieved the standard OPV3 coverage of above 80 percent and the overall improvement in immunization coverage has not been uniform throughout the country, " it said.

It said, "the government and development partners have intensified the National Immunization Day as seen from the recent February and May rounds in the north, in which 1,279,380 children were immunized against polio, achieving 93 percent coverage in the first round."

"The greater risk to global polio eradication is the ongoing transmission in the remaining endemic areas," it added.

Source: Xinhua