Sustaining a Polio-free World: A strategy for long-term success defines the global technical standards for functions that are essential to achieve and maintain a polio-free world: vaccination, surveillance, outbreak preparedness and response, and containment. The strategy includes core activities that will be needed after certification of wild poliovirus type 1 eradication and elimination of variant poliovirus type 2 to support progress toward the global certification of eradication for all types of polio.
The strategy has three goals:
- protect populations: withdraw the live attenuated oral polio vaccine (OPV) from use in routine immunization and immunize populations with the inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) against possible re-emergence of any poliovirus;
- detect and respond: promptly detect any poliovirus in a human or in the environment and rapidly respond to prevent transmission; and
- contain polioviruses: achieve and sustain safe and secure containment of polioviruses in laboratories, vaccine manufacturers and other facilities to prevent reintroduction in a polio-free world.
The strategy revises the Polio Post-Certification Strategy, developed in 2018, and reflects broad changes, including the development of the GPEI Polio Eradication Strategy, new technologies (such as the novel oral polio vaccine type 2), new and updated global health frameworks, and other changes to the programmatic landscape. The strategy presents options for a future governance structure and accountability mechanisms and a global cost estimate, both of which will be critical to the strategy’s implementation.
