Rotary Bangladesh Polio Trip Presentation, Jan. 23

YOU ARE INVITED!

January 23, 7:15 - 8:30 AM

Skips Restaurant, Chelmsford

Rotarians and nonrotarians alike are welcome to come hear Carl Good's presentation on his recent Rotary trip to India and Bangladesh. Carl went there with 17 other Rotarians from the United States, Canada, and Europe to help give out polio immunizations. Carl has photos and videos on what he calls " one of the best trips of his life."
Carl will make the presentation at the January 23 meeting of the Merrimack Valley Rotary. We are a breakfast group that meets at 7:15 AM at Skips Restaurant in Chelmsford. Breakfast is $11:00.

For more information contact Club president Ken Masson at 978-446-9366 or by writing to mvrotary@gmail.com

For all of Carl's reports from his trip, visit the MV Rotary blog at http://mvrotary.blogspot.com/

MVR's Carl Good Is One Of 700,000 Volunteers In Bangladesh Who Are Immunizing Children

Carl Good's latest report from Bangladesh

Hi,
Others are waiting to use the computer so this will be short. We have finished our program in Bangladesh and will fly to Calcutta tomorrow for more visits to hospitals, orphanages and a hospice that was run by mother Teressa. The experience has been fantastic. I have stayed with a Vet. who is a Rotary member and president of his club to minimize expenses. During the day we would do the immunizations.
The first day the whole country was tackled seeking out every child under 5. This required 700,000 volunteers!!! Has any thing like this ever been done in the US?

Our group is a small part but Rotary in Bangladesh is the major driver and participant in this program. Before the NIDs one in 20 children in Bangladesh had polio. For four years due to this program, there were none. Then, several cases were seen in 2006 that were imported from India. Since then there has been none. The only way to keep polio in check is to make sure that the children continue to be immunized. We have met with WHO and UNICEF leaders in Bangladesh. They are expanding the program to other childhood immunizations.

The pictures attached show me doing an immunization, the cooler carried by the volunteers and paid ($1.30 per day) workers, some of the children in a slum being helped and the Rotary family that have put me up an taken care of me during my visit. Bangladesh is full of people. I have so much more to show and tell but time is limited tonight so this is it. My going was spur of the moment decision but one of the best decisions I ever made.

MVR Carl Good Reports On Polio Immunization Activites In Bangladesh

Merrimack Valley Rotary's Carl Good's latest posting from Bangladesh.....

Hi,

Everything is going very well and the people have been extremely friendly. I should mention the great work done by our two leaders, Dave Groner (Michigan) and Ann Lee Hussey (Maine). They have been on over 10 of these Rotary polio immunization programs including sites in Africa and India. For these efforts each participant pays his or her own way to work in what can be dangerous environments.On Sat. the 8th we did the main immunization participating in the Bangladesh National Immunization Day where they try to immunize every child under 5 in the whole country.

They have immunization booths with a small cooler containing a few vials of vaccine all over the country, many staffed by local Rotary members. The organization is very impressive. There was a time not too long ago when one child in 20 had polio in this country. Before last year, due to this program they had several years in which the country was polio free. Last year however, polio was imported from India and a few cases were identified.I immunized children at several booths staffed by local rotary members and others.

The process is simple as one just squeezes two drops of oral vaccine in to the open mouth of the recipient. A lot of our job is to give the NID participants our support, encourage their efforts and sort of show the flag. I believe that we are the first American Rotary group to participate with the program in Bangladesh. Sunday the 9th I went house to house with a couple of young girls, Sumi and Lizu, (18 yrs old) looking for children that were missed on the NID (National Immunization Day). They are paid about $1.30 a day.

The purpose of the house to house effort is to find and immunize children that were missed on the NID. We would go to an apartment complex or slum and knock on every door to see if there was a child inside that had not been immunized and ask if there were other children in the building.After a home had been visited the girls would write the date and our team number on their door with chalk to indicate that the location had been visited. Some doors still had the chalk mark from the last visit earlier in the year. Most children at our locations had been immunized but I did another 6 in this effort. This clean up program lasts 4 days but is only done in the morning. Our base was a women’s health clinic that was also a polio immunization site. After our immunizing I talked to the director who showed me her small laboratory that does HIV tests along with a few other types of test such as pregnancy.To my very pleasant surprise they were using the Capillus rapid HIV test developed by one of my groups at Cambridge Biotech in the 90s. It was very fulfilling to see this product now made by Trinity Biotech in Ireland helping people half way around the world.

In the afternoon we drove out of Dhaka and visited a weaving plant owned by a Rotary member, a Bangladesh Rotary financed free housing project on a river and a Bangladesh Rotary financed arsenic free water system at a boy’s orphanage. This trip shows one what poverty really is. In the evening we had a dinner with the district president and other Rotary members. I went in native dress. Today, the 10th, we did house to house immunizations again, I worked with the same two girls. Each was dressed in a sari that would make you think that they were well to do.However, after our work was complete I visited Sumi’s home, an apartment, that was very small and seemed to house a number of people. We would consider it a slum.

I gave the children gifts and enjoyed some tea while we talked. By the way, most of the people are very clean but their homes and living environment is not. In the afternoon we visited a free woman’s hospital hearing a presentation and seeing some of the wards. It was minimal. They provide each mother with a plastic ware table setting and food box when they go home. The food box, enough for a few days, is provided once a month for 4 months. They hope to provide more food in the future.One must remember that this is the capital of the country and that things are worse outside the cities. I am on a dial up connection and cannot send any pictures but will do that at a later date. This is sad because the pictures really tell the story.

All the best Carl

MVR's Carl Good Continues Polio Project

Today we visited the WHO polio headquarters in Delhi and heard a presentation from the head of the program. Then we went to the airport and flew to Dhaka Bangladesh. They said that we had to be at the airport 3 hours before the flight and they were not kidding. The process took a long time. The baggage limitation was less on this flight than the international flight so we had to pay ~$350 in excess baggage fees. But we are now in a hotel in Dhaka and tomorrow will go to the homes of Rotary members who will host us for the rest of our stay in Bangladesh.

The trip from the airport was similar to that in Delhi with incredible traffic and many beggars who would attack our bus when we were caught at a light or stopped by traffic. However, here many we selling popcorn. I didn't know that it was so popular here. Many of the buses and taxes run on compressed natural gas as in Delhi to reduce pollution.

Flying in it was amazing that there was so much water considering that we are about 200km from the shore. This is certainly a wet country.


During each immunization effort 176 million children are immunized in 3-4 days
200 million houses visited
1.1 million house to house teams
2.7 million vaccinators deployed
155,00 supervisors deployed
800,000 booths set up

This is indeed a massive effort that is done several times a year, partially because of the high birth rate in the effected areas which are primarily in the north of the country. The country of India is now bearing about 70 % of the cost which was not the case in the past.
since the program started the incidence of polio has been reduced 99% but it still exists.

Rotary has contributed over 633 million dollars to the world wide effort over the years not to mention the in country and visiting Rotary volunteers that have participated in the program at their own expense.

The Gates matching grant of 100 million is large but not as large as what has already been contributed by Rotary members.

Carl Good Meets Polio Patients In Bangladesh

Latest post from Carl Good's blog.....pictured is Carl with some heart repair patients. Carl is from the Merrimack Valley Rotary Club.

Hi all,

Today we started out with an orientation meeting in the hotel lobby with more cautions with regard to the immunization process and our own intestinal health. While I am optimistic about the immunizations, my intestinal health may be another matter. We were told to bring our own toilet paper as well as avoiding anything that is not bottles or is steaming hot. Tomorrow we start by visiting the World Health Organization headquarters in Delhi and then fly to Dhaka. Tomorrow night will be in a hotel but from then on we will be staying at the home of a Rotary member in Bangladesh. There will be 2.4 million immunizations using the oral Sabin vaccine in this effort with the participation of 4,000 local Rotary members from 52 clubs. Our group will be doing some of the immunizations which require us to get the drops into the child's mouth.After our orientation meeting this morning we were bussed to the Escorts Heart Institute that has Rotary support and met with doctors and patients. For children the most common operation is closing a hole between the two sides of the heart which costs about $1,600. A man from the Netherlands was there who funds one operation a month from his own funds. Rotary provides support through the "Gift of Life" project. It is amazing how many Rotary clubs there are in India and Bangladesh and how active they are in this and the polio immunization program.In the afternoon we went to St. Stephens Hospital, the oldest in India, and visited the polio ward, talks to patients and doctors. It is heart wrenching to see these deformed children knowing that the disease is preventable. The hospital performs surgery to correct some of the deformity and provides braces and training for dealing with the disease. Again, Rotary provides support and most of the costs are not borne by the patients many of whom cannot afford the trip to Delhi for treatment. The program is being extended to outlying hospitals. In Bangladesh polio has been eradicated but has come back due to transmission from Nigeria through Pakistan and India. I suppose that the organizers scheduled this hospital visit so that we could see what happens if immunizations are not carried out. An interesting tidbit is that many children have chronic diarrhea which since the vaccine contains live virus and sanitation is poor, the immunized can actually provide immunizations to those they come in contact with that have not been officially immunized.

MVR' Carl Good Arrives In India

Below is Carl Good's, Merrimack Valley Rotary, first posting from his trip to Bangladesh. Carl is in India as of December 4. The report below is from his Blog.

After much snow, wind, earlier flight and harry landing in Newark, part of the group assembled for the flight to Delhi. Others are coming from Canada and Europe on separate flights. The guy next to me on the Boeing 777 flight to India was a native who is living in Albany NY for his children's education and returns to his home in Delhi three times a year. Soon he will go back for good.The 14 hr flight was pleasant as was the bus to the hotel. We all got wreaths of real marigolds. However, Delhi has a significant pollution problem with odder and haze. Supposedly it is much better than before. Tomorrow we have an orientation, WHO meeting and a hospital visit. The plan is to fly to Bangladesh the day after tomorrow to start work on vaccinations. All the best

MVR's Carl Good Heads To Bangladesh

Best of luck to Merrimack Valley Rotary member Carl Good, who is leaving with 17 Rotarians from the United States, Canada and Europe to Bangladesh on December 3. He will be in Bangladesh for two weeks immunizing for polio in that area. This project is funded by each individual and they will be staying with other Rotarians in the area to help defray costs.
Eradicatin of Polio is one of Rotary International's major projects and Bangladesh is one of the last area's in the world were cases of polio still exist.
The four countries including Nigeria, India, Pakistan and Afghanistan, are still considered polio-endemic.
Two hundred and ten countries, territories and areas are now polio-free (including China), and 134 of these, which contain half the world’s population, have been certified polio-free by independent commissions.
Our hopes and prayers are with Carl and the other Rotarians who are taking on this important mission.
May it be a tremendous success!