Polio in the United Kingdom: Should the rest of the world be concerned? - Bega District News

Infectious diseases expert at the Australian National University, Associate Professor Sanjaya Senanayake, said that while the detection was cause for concern, it is unlikely that Australia will see a resurgence of the mostly-eradicated virus.

"If you look at the UK Health Security Agencies announcements, probably every year they get one to three cases or situations where they find polio in the sewage every year," Professor Senanayake said.

But what they're seeing now in the UK is between February and June, a large number of cases in an area which is a population of about 4 million people where the polio virus they've identified is genetically related.".

So how did polio seemingly return to the United Kingdom overnight, after 40 years without an active case.

The injection contains an inactive strain of the virus, but the oral form includes a live virus that is then ingested and sits in the gut.

It's not a form that is common across much of the world anymore, but historically, the oral vaccine was given to children usually on top of a sugar cube or with syrup.

"The good thing about the oral polio vaccine is that even though it's alive, it's excreted in the poo and gets into the sewage," explained Professor Senanayake.

"And by doing that, in countries with low [vaccine] coverage and lots of polio, particularly third world countries, it means that if people don't wash their hands properly or eat contaminated food, they can actually get the vaccine-derived poliovirus from the sewage and they can also get vaccinated or immunised.".

There is no risk of contracting the live poliovirus from the injected form of the vaccine, but there is very low risk with the oral form.

For this reason, many parts of the world, including the United Kingdom and Australia, have moved away from this form of vaccination.

The United Kingdom has not used the oral vaccine since 2004.

"About one in 3 million people can actually get neurological symptoms from the oral vaccine itself," Professor Senanayake said.

"And when polio was running around the world, one-in-200 meant large numbers, particularly of children who were getting paralysis," Professor Senanayake said.

The type of polio that has been detected in East London is believed to have been derived from the oral vaccination.

Because this form of vaccination is not used in the United Kingdom, Professor Senanayake believes it's likely arrived with people who have come from overseas.

"It can be an asymptomatic disease," Professor Senanayake said.