Global Priorities and Local Realities: Exploring what happens to children identified with Acute Flaccid Paralysis under the Pulse Polio Programme in Uttar Pradesh, India

ii Executive summary Background Poliomyelitis, or polio, is a paralytic disease of virus aetiology in children transmitted faecal-orally. It causes acute flaccid paralysis (AFP) in less than 1%, but once this occurs, can lead to lifelong paralysis, or residual paralysis. Prevention by vaccines is essential because there is no curative treatment. Those infected, irrespective of severity, shed the virus in their stools for weeks, potentially infecting others. In 1988, the Global Polio Eradication Initiatives was launched to eradicate polio from the world, and much