The Government is to provide £2.1 million aid to the Global Polio Eradication Initiative over the next three years, it was announced today.
Minister of State at the Department of Foreign Affairs Ms Liz O'Donnell said Ireland Aid will continue to support programmes aimed at improving the health of the poor and of addressing preventable diseases such as HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis and polio.
Speaking to representatives of the World Health Organisation, UNICEF and Rotary International today, the Minister said there was a chance polio would be eradicated completely by 2005.
Since Global Polio Eradication Initiative was launched 13 years ago the number of cases have fallen by 99 per cent an estimated 350,000 worldwide.
By the end of 2000 the number of polio-infected countries had fallen to 20 from 125 in 1988.
The main concentration of polio infections is in sub-Saharan African and Indian sub-continent.