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Europe could be at risk from polio following a recent outbreak in Syria, according to infectious disease experts.
Two doctors in Germany have written to the Lancet journal warning that the cases in Syria - which had been free of wild poliovirus since 1999 - could endanger neighbouring regions.
Prof Martin Eichner, of the University of Tubingen and Stefan Brockmann, of Reutlingen Regional Public Health Office says that because only one in 200 people infected develop paralysis it might take nearly a year of "silent transmission" before an outbreak is detected. In that time hundreds of individuals could be carrying the infection.
The doctors explain that most European countries use inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) rather than the live oral polio vaccine (OPV), because the latter can, in rare cases, lead to cases of acute flaccid paralysis, the main symptom of polio.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-24854920
Two doctors in Germany have written to the Lancet journal warning that the cases in Syria - which had been free of wild poliovirus since 1999 - could endanger neighbouring regions.
Prof Martin Eichner, of the University of Tubingen and Stefan Brockmann, of Reutlingen Regional Public Health Office says that because only one in 200 people infected develop paralysis it might take nearly a year of "silent transmission" before an outbreak is detected. In that time hundreds of individuals could be carrying the infection.
The doctors explain that most European countries use inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) rather than the live oral polio vaccine (OPV), because the latter can, in rare cases, lead to cases of acute flaccid paralysis, the main symptom of polio.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-24854920