Finally, good news on the health front. Next year will be crucial for India’s polio eradication programme, which appears on track with only one case reported so far this year. “If no wild polio virus is identified throughout the high-transmission season in 2012,” said an article in a US Centres for Disease Control journal, “India will be regarded as polio-free”.
Experts say this would put the WHO’s Southeast Asia region, which includes India, on track to be certified polio-free by 2014.
But they warn that though there haven’t been any cases since January 2011, there is always a risk of an outbreak among migrant populations and residents of high-risk areas in western Uttar Pra-desh and central Bihar and among migrants in other states.
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TN N-PLANT is SAFE: KALAM
Age Correspondent
Tirunelveli, Nov. 6
Former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam said on Sunday that he is satisfied with the safety features of the nuclear reactors at Koodankulam nuclear power project (KKNPP). However, he said he has no intention of mediating betw-een administration and the agitating people.