WHO Declares India Polio-Free

A recent report shows that India's last case of the contagious polio virus was detected in January 2011 in a 2-year-old girl in the state of West Bengal.

Poonam Khetrpal Singh, a WHO Southeast Asia official, notes that this is a day the community has dreamt about.

"It is a day that all countries fought hard for, and a day when all stakeholders come together to celebrate the victory of mankind over a dreaded disease that, for centuries, has killed and disabled legions," he said, via Thomson Reuters Foundation.

Without any new cases in the last three years, the South East Asia region is now the fourth region to be added on the polio-free list after the Americas, Western Pacific and European regions. Only Eastern Mediterranean and African regions have yet to be declared polio-free.

"This is very significant because before this region was certified polio-free, we had half the world's population polio free,"  Singh said, according to BBC News. "With the South East Asia region being added we now have 80% of the population polio free. This was a problem the region was struggling with for a long time, but now finally, we are polio free."

As polio is a vaccine-preventable disease that hits the central nervous system, the infection can be irreversible within just a few hours. Children under 5 are particularly susceptible to infection, especially in areas with poor sanitation.