Poliovirus detected in NYC sewage; health officials urge vaccination

New York's health officials are ramping up efforts to increase the number of children who arevaccinated against the disease.

On Friday, August 12, New York state and New York City health officials announced that poliovirus had been detected for the first time in New York City sewage, suggesting local circulation of the virus.

During the months of May, June, and July, sewage samples were found in Rockland and Orange counties. On July 21, health officials in Rockland county reported a case of paralytic polio in a young, unvacccinated male resident who had not recently traveled out of the country. In June, the man's symptoms started.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, only a small number of people develop paralysis after being exposed to the vaccine. The identification of the paralytic case last month shows that hundreds of others could have also been affected. The cumulative number of cases may be in the thousands.

"For every one case of paralytic polio identified, hundreds more may be undetected," New York State Health Commissioner Mary Bassett said in a statement. "The detection of poliovirus in wastewater samples in New York City is alarming, but not surprising." New York City, state, and CDC officials are "responding urgently" and "aggressively assessing spread," she added.

Those who are unvaccinated are the only ones who are at risk of contracting the disease. Most Americans are not at risk due to their vaccinations. Most children get the first three doses of the vaccine by the time they're 18 months old. Between the ages of 4 and 6 there is a fourth dose. There are pockets of low vaccine rates in New York City and the surrounding suburbs.

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Risk and luck

Almost 80 percent of New York's children received the first three doses by the age of 2. The vaccine rate for children under 2 is only 60 percent. It's under 59 percent in children under 2. In New York City, the vaccine rate is higher, but it's been decreasing. Fourteen percent of NYC children are vulnerable to the dangerous disease because only 86 percent of them are fully vaccined.

"The risk to New Yorkers is real but the defense is so simple—get vaccinated against polio," New York City Health Commissioner Dr. Ashwin Vasan said in a statement. "With polio circulating in our communities there is simply nothing more essential than vaccinating our children to protect them from this virus, and if you're an unvaccinated or incompletely vaccinated adult, please choose now to get the vaccine. Polio is entirely preventable and its reappearance should be a call to action for all of us."

There are other officials scrambling to address a resurgence of the disease. The UK announced this week that they had found 116 cases of the disease in at least eight London boroughs. The officials are working to make sure all children are protected from vaccine-related diseases.

David Salisbury, WHO Global Commission for Certification of Polio Eradication, said in a statement that it is good luck that nobody has been paralyzed from the viruses that have been picked up. Unvaccinated or under-vaccinated people are at risk if they don't get their vaccinations.

In London and New York, officials have detected a strain of vaccine-derived polioviruses, which is related to the oral vaccine. The vaccines that are no longer used in the UK and US are safe and effective. If they're given in areas with poor hygiene, improper Sanitation, and low vaccinations, the vaccine virus can spread and cause disease.