Polio vaccine drive targets 41 million African children

This week, the UN children’s fund, Unicef, launched an emergency vaccination drive in 18 states in northern Nigeria and neighbouring Chad, Niger, Cameroon and Central African Republic, to immunise more than 41 million children.

Polio cases could be wiped out within 12 months, says World Health Organisation

Nearly 39,000 health workers will be deployed across the Lake Chad basin, where ongoing conflict with the insurgent group Boko Haram has forced 2.6 million people to flee their homes (pdf), leading to fears the virus could spread across borders.

The four-day campaign will be the third of five vaccination drives to contain the wild strain of the polio virus. Two further campaigns are scheduled for November and December in Nigeria and neighbouring countries.