By Jasmine Willis
DANSVILLE — Thousands of rotary clubs all over the world are working together to shed some light on polio.
World Polio Day is held on Oct. 24 and its main focus is to put an end to Polio.
Dansville Rotary Club plans to participate in this ongoing effort to put a stop to this terrible illness.
On Oct. 10 the club met at Scovill’s to discuss ideas on what to do next year for an entire month of World Polio Awareness.
Nancy Nice, Dansville Rotary Club president talked about finding an article on a Polio case found in the Philippines recently.
“It hasn’t been around for 20 years, and now we are hearing reports of a strong case of it being found in the Philippines. That is very scary to think about. If it isn’t contained it could get to us over here,” she said. “Right now, we are doing a small campaign to put the focus on World Polio Day on Oct. 24. We will have posters up on Main Street talking about the importance of this day.”
Nice said the rotary clubs all over the world are taking part in this, and Bill Gates is matching two dollars for every dollar made by the rotary international.
“I want to dedicate the whole month of October to bringing awareness to Polio. We were late getting started on it this year, but next year I plan on dedicating the whole month to it. We want to educate people on how serious this is, because it is possible for it to come back again,” she said. “The younger generations don’t know anything about Polio. They don’t understand how dangerous it can be.”
Nice added that a lot of the problem is lack of clean water and sanitation.
“We need to work on teaching them how to maintain clean water, and keep everything sanitized. We need to show them how to get grants for clean water. People don’t understand how rare clean water is for a lot of others in the world. We take it for granted here. We are lucky to have clean water we can cook, drink, and bathe in,” she said. “There are people all over the world who live in sewage and have no clean water. We need to help them sustain whatever clean water they do have. We also help them get the medical equipment they need, so they can feel better and get to work.”
Nice said she joined the rotary club so she could be part of something bigger and worthwhile.
For more information on World Polio Day and the importance of the efforts made by the rotary clubs visit https://www.endpolio.org/world-polio-day