Global efforts to eradicate polio suffered a setback in August when, after two years free of transmission, two cases of polio were detected in Borno state, followed by another in September.
The global goal to eradicate polio encountered a setback when in 2003 04 the rejection of polio vaccination in northern Nigeria followed rumours that the vaccine contained chemicals that would sterilize children and reports that an unregistered drug was used in northern Nigeria during a meningitis outbreak in 1996 which left several children paralysed (Jegede 2007).
28 For example, the Gates Foundation's campaign to eradicate polio met with significant setbacks that reinforce the importance of a broad understanding of delivery outcomes in the planning process.
But still, there is no assurance that all the children in the hard-to-reach areas are safe from polio and this might just prove a major setback in the quest to eradicate the disease.
The killings, with eerie echoes of attacks that killed nine female polio workers in Pakistan in December, represented another serious setback for the global effort to eradicate polio.
The cases involved a 4-year-old and a 10-month old in south-eastern Ukraine, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO), in a setback for the global effort to eradicate the potentially deadly virus.
"For sure this is a major setback," to the global campaign to eradicate polio, says Rosenbauer, who calls the killings "horrific".
It also deals yet another serious setback to the agency's efforts to eradicate the disease by year's end.
In another setback to the 17-year effort to eradicate polio, Somalia has become the 10th polio-free country to be reinfected since late last year.
Dr Margaret Chan, the WHO Director-General, told the World Health Assembly in May that a "surge" in cases of the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (Mers) and the "setback" for the world's efforts to eradicate polio had sparked fears around the world.
Earlier setbacks forced the W.H.O. to revise to 2005 its original goal of eradicating polio by 2000.
