Polio has been kicked out of 10 west and central African countries as a result of mass immunization drives reaching as many as 100 million children across much of the region, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) has said.

The previously polio-free countries, including Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea, Mali and Togo, were reinfected by an outbreak in northern Nigeria following a vaccine boycott.

"The epidemic has paralyzed nearly 200 children for life since mid-2003, but no new cases have been reported in these countries since early June," according to a UNICEF statement made available on Saturday.

"At the same time, polio eradication efforts are intensifying in Nigeria, where extensive disease transmission continues, as part of a mass polio campaign across 28 African countries" beginning early this week, it added.

But a 200 million US dollars funding gap for 2006 must urgently be filled, and 75 million US dollars of which is needed by December, to ensure activities in the first quarter of next year can proceed, it said.

Since 1988, global eradication efforts have reduced the number of polio cases by more than 99 percent, from 350,000 annually to 1, 469 cases in 2005, but the target of wiping out the disease globally by 2005 will not be realized due to the ongoing polio transmission in part of Nigeria.

The northern Nigerian state of Kano and neighboring states stopped the immunization of their children for 10 months in 2003- 2004 on the allegation that the vaccine contained infertility agents purportedly planted by western nations to depopulate the area.

Experts say that at least a further year will be needed to finish the job in Nigeria, following the 10-month suspension. Five other countries, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Niger and Egypt, also remain polio endemic.

Source: Xinhua