Independent Monitoring Board - Global Polio Eradication Initiative

CONCLUSIONSThe 2010-12 Strategic Plan aims to stop polio transmission by the end of 2012. Thisgoal has long been off track. It remains so, although recent months have seen theProgramme’s progress accelerate. Each infected country has – now, or at sometime in recent years – demonstrated its capability and will. The challenge is for eachto achieve peak performance quickly and simultaneously. Once every country isreaching enough missed children, transmission will quickly be stopped. It would bepremature to entirely rule-out achieving the end-2012 milestone.The current position of the Programme is strong in many ways, creating anopportunity to build momentum that really must be seized. It must be seized byaddressing the substantial risks to the eradication sgoal – the financial shortfallchief amongst them. It must be seized by being ambitious about the furtherprogrammatic improvements that are possible.Our recommendations address the major concerns at global level. We ask thatcountry programmes reflect on our findings, nationally and in every sanctuary. Themost urgent improvements are needed in Nigeria and in Afghanistan.The challenge of stopping transmission is a challenge of reaching missed children.The Programme’s focus on this has sharpened a little in the last year, but still has farto go.We will next review progress at the end of October 2012. We urge that eachcountry and each partner grip the challenges that remain. The prize of a polio-freeworld is drawing closer, but is far from secure.42Independent Monitoring Board of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative Every Missed Child