 | | | Rotary International Director-Elect Brad Howard accepts donation to Polio Plus. From left: Cliff Dochterman, Nora Avelar, and Brad Howard. Photo Gary Irwin | | | | | | A donation totaling $24,000 to Polio Plus, the worldwide campaign to eradicate the disease of polio, was given to Rotarian Brad Howard, a director-elect of Rotary International and past president of Oakland Sunrise Rotary, by Moraga Rotary president Nora Avelar; $8,000 of this donation was given specifically for this purpose by Rotarians and guests at the recent "A Nite at the Races" dinner/auction held recently in Moraga, and will be tripled through an arrangement with The Rotary Foundation and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. So far, the Gates Foundation has contributed $460 million toward the effort.
The Polio Plus program to eradicate polio began in 1979, when the Rotary International Health, Hunger, and Humanity Committee, chaired by now-Moraga Rotarian Cliff Dochterman, worked with local Rotarians to complete the eradication of polio from the Philippines. In 1987, Rotary began the worldwide project and raised $240 million from its members; with that sum and the promise of 1.3 million worldwide volunteers, they began a partnership with the World Health Organization, UNICEF, and the U. S. Center for Disease Control. Dochterman continued for several years on Rotary's International Polio Plus Committee, and participated in several national immunization days in various third world countries. He continued his involvement when he was president of Rotary International in '92-'93.
Through these collaborative efforts, polio only exists today in small parts of three countries, and the annual number of new cases has gone from about 400,000 to less than 200. Coincidentally, in March 2014, the nation of India was declared polio-free after three years without a new case. Two of the three strains of polio have been eradicated, and the efforts to complete the job have intensified.
Rotary Club of Moraga is a local service club within Rotary International that meets most Tuesdays at noon at Saint Mary's College. For information, please call Frank May of Moraga Rotary at (925) 376-8195.
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Lamorinda Weekly, Moraga CA