Polio eradication strategy 2022\u20132026 : delivering on a promise

Abstract

Over the last decade, the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) made steady progress on the path to eradication. Wild poliovirus types 2 and 3 (WPV2 and WPV3) were declared eradicated in 2015 and 2019, respectively; the World Health Organization (WHO) South-East Asia Region was declared free of poliovirus in 2014; and most recently, the WHO African Region was certified free of wild poliovirus (WPV) in August 2020. However, the final steps towards eradication have proven the most difficult.The GPEI now faces programmatic and epidemiological challenges that demand new approaches to place the partnership and impacted countries on an emergency footing (see Annex B). To achieve a polio-free world, the GPEI has re-envisioned the endgame pathway with an urgent call for collective ownership and accountability across the GPEI partnership and with governments, communities and all other stakeholders.The Polio Eradication Strategy 2022\u20132026 offers a comprehensive set of actions that will position the GPEI to deliver on a promise that brought the world together in a collective commitment to eradicate polio. These actions, many of which are already under way in 2021, will strengthen and empower the GPEI to meet challenges head-on and achieve and sustain a polio-free world.The GPEI will transform its approach in each region and country through five mutually reinforcing objectives that lay the foundation to achieve two elemental goals: Goal One to permanently interrupt all poliovirus transmission in the final WPV-endemic countries of Afghanistan and Pakistan, and Goal Two to stop circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus (cVDPV) transmission and prevent outbreaks in non-endemic countries.Suggested citation. Polio Eradication Strategy 2022\u20132026: Delivering on a promise. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2021. Licence: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO.9789240031937-eng.pdf2021ISBN 978-92-4-003193-7 (electronic version)ISBN 978-92-4-003194-4 (print version)1095