During an interview by Isa Sa’idu in 2007, Professor Haruna Kaita, in the faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria maintained that “Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV) is not safe for human consumption. …I was among the people that went to India to analyse scientifically the OPV. After that we found them contaminated with a lot of agents. Anything that is not supposed to be there is a contaminant. It can either be product base or process base. If it is product base it can be degradation of the product or converted to other things among others. Contamination can also occur during the process maybe from the container or any other thing associated with the process. These are some of the technical terms as professionals we concern ourselves with because we are dealing with human lives.”
News stories in 2005 and 2008 reported infant deaths following administration of polio drops. According to a Punjab Newsline article, a spokesperson for the Haryana Health Department declared that the 2008 death of an Indian baby was merely coincidental because “the vaccine is fully safe and has no side effects of any kind even if administered to seriously ill children.” In 2005, a 28-day-old girl in Amrali village in Ropar district died eight hours after OPV was dropped into her mouth. Her family alleged that the health worker who’d administered the vaccine had opened the polio vaccine container with a nail-cutter and had later termed as ‘‘normal’’ the infant’s deteriorating condition following vaccination.
As many as 26 simian (monkey) viruses contaminated monkey kidney tissue-cultured polio vaccines given to countless North American children and adults in the 1950’s and 60’s. In particular, Simian Virus 40 (SV40) was of great concern. In their 1960 paper, “The Vacuolating Virus : SV40”, Drs Sweet and Hilleman stated: “This new virus represents the detection for the first time of a hitherto non-detectable simian virus of monkey renal cultures and raises the important question of the existence of other such viruses. All three types of Sabin’s live polio virus vaccine were contaminated.”
The March 14, 2008 issue of Vaccine featured an article titled “OPV cannot eradicate polio from India: Do we need any further evidence?” It stated: “Polio eradication programme was launched in India in 1995, and polio eradication was expected to occur by 2000. Remarkable decline in polio incidence occurred, but, polio was not eradicated. Majority of polio cases are occurring in two states viz., Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. It is also being observed that majority of polio cases had received many doses of polio vaccine. In 2005 monovalent OPV1 (mOPV1) and monovalent OPV3 (mOPV3) were also introduced in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, but, number of polio cases increased 10-fold in 2006. In 2007 number of vaccination rounds were increased to one round every month, but in 2007 number of polio cases increased further. In 2005 there were 66 polio cases whereas in 2006 and 2007 number of polio cases increased to 676 and 863, respectively. Some genetic factors in children from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar appear to be responsible for poor antibody generation by OPV. Some mutations in polio viruses may be responsible for development of resistance to antibodies generated by OPV and a reason for the recent steep rise in polio incidence since 2006. Because of these two factors, OPV cannot eradicate polio from India.”
The countries where “eradication” programs are taking place are some of the poorest on earth. Do they need the death and disability imposed upon them by an ineffective program conducted in such a blindly detached manner?
Police starts asking questions – Express News Service (Chandigarh Newsline) (story no longer available online)
Infant’s death after taking polio vaccine is coincidence, says HHD by Neeraj Mohan (Punjab News Online)
OPV cannot eradicate polio from India: Do we need any further evidence? by Yash Paul (ScienceDirect)