Thursday 24 October marks the annual World Polio Day, a chance for public and civil society partners to raise awareness and resources for the global effort to eradicate polio.

Rotary International and Rotarians around the world are using the day as an opportunity to showcase the current status of the eradication effort, and what steps need to be taken to ultimately achieve a lasting world free of all polioviruses.

2024 is a special year for the eradication effort.  An outbreak of variant poliovirus type 2 in Gaza has drawn the world’s attention on the reality that as long as polio exists anywhere, all countries will remain at risk.

But the outbreak in Gaza has also shown something else: the incredible global commitment to achieving a polio-free world.  Against all odds, in September and October, two rounds of outbreak response were implemented in Gaza, each time reaching well over half a million children with the lifesaving polio vaccine and other health interventions.  If it can be achieved here, amid all the challenges the people of Gaza currently face, it can be achieved everywhere.

That is why this year’s World Polio Day is perhaps an opportunity not just to celebrate progress: but indeed, to re-garner support and commitment at all levels to finish the job once and for all.

Because the reality is: there are no technical, medical or biological reasons why polio should persist anywhere in the world today.  Polio can be eradicated, there is no question about that.  And it will be eradicated on the very day that we finally reach the remaining un- or under-vaccinated children in a few remaining endemic hotspots. Not a day earlier… nor a day later.

Let us therefore focus all our efforts on that one goal: to reach and vaccinate every last child. Success will then follow automatically.

Take a look at some of the World Polio Day 2024 events around the world and visit the Make Polio History website to lend your voice to the efforts.