The World Health Organization (WHO) will hand over a new modular polio laboratory to Nigeria’s premier polio laboratory in the Department of Virology, University of Ibadan, Oyo state Friday.
A statement from the organization said the laboratory which was purchased with a grant from United States Agency for International Aid (USAID), will support polio eradication activities in Nigeria.The Minister of Health, Professor Isaac Adewole who incidentally gave the consent for the donation of the Modular Laboratory when he was the Vice Chancellor of the University, is expected to be the Special Guest of Honour at the event.
Other dignitaries that will witness the hand-over ceremony include the acting WHO Country Representative (WR) and US Consul General to Nigeria among others.Dr Rex Mpazanje, the acting WR stated “the gold standard for polio surveillance in the Polio Eradication Programme is the detection of cases of acute flaccid paralysis (AFP) and laboratory testing of stool specimens from these suspect polio cases in a WHO accredited laboratory. Environmental surveillance (ES), on the other hand, is complimentary to AFP surveillance as it can also detect circulation of wild and/or vaccine-derived polio viruses in the population”.
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