The World Health Organization experts on Wednesday vowed to eradicate polio in Africa by June next year in a campaign aimed at preventing possible crossover of the disease from neighboring countries.

WHO epidemiologist in charge of East Africa Akpala Kalu said the UN health agency has launched intensive campaign in the Horn of Africa countries, targeting children under the age of five in order to curb new infections.

Kalu told a media briefing in Nairobi that the polio eradication plan for the Horn of Africa region is progressing well and spread of the outbreak had been contained in several countries in the region.

"Polio has got no boundary. Several cases have been identified in neighboring countries bordering Kenya. We are also improving the quality of our campaigns through strategies involving vaccine, surveillance and immunization and hope to contain it by June next year," Kalu said.

The WHO also blamed the re-emergence of the crippling disease on the rejection by some African communities of efforts to immunize children, a factor it says has led to the re-emergence of the wild strains of the disease in Nigeria.

The Kenyan government, WHO and UNICEF plan the second round of anti-polio this weekend to preempt a possible crossover of the disease from neighboring countries, which has recently reported some cases.

The campaign follows recent WHO reports that Sudan, Somalia, Eritrea, Ethiopia and Yemen had recorded polio cases recently, said James Nyikal, director of Medical Services at the Kenyan Health Ministry.

He said the campaigns, which will kick off on November 5-9, target children under the age of five and will take place in 12 high risk districts that share a border with the five countries.

"The planned polio vaccination campaign is an emergency protective measure aiming at rapidly boosting children's immunity against polio," said Nyikal.

The physician said a total of 1.3 million children below 5 years of age living in 12 high risk districts of Northeastern, Eastern and Coast provinces will be vaccinated against polio including those who had previously completed their polio vaccinations.

The ongoing polio epidemic that started in West and Central Africa last year has so far spread to 16 previously polio-free countries and established transmission in 10 countries.

Source: Xinhua