New Gates Polio Vaccine Linked to Paralysis Outbreaks in Africa: Officials Confirm 7 Children Paralyzed

The Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) and health officials in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Burundi have announced that seven children have been paralyzed by vaccine-derived polio linked to the nOPV2 polio vaccine, which was developed by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The Gates Foundation, a GPEI partner, funded the development and clinical trials for the nOPV2 vaccine. Vaccine-derived polio outbreaks are not unexpected with the nOPV2 vaccine, GPEI said. While detection of these outbreaks is a tragedy for the families and communities affected, it is not unexpected with wider use of the vaccine.

The oral vaccines, administered in much of Africa, the Middle East, and parts of Asia, contain a live-but-weakened form of the polio virus modified to minimize its ability to paralyze. Children vaccinated with the live oral vaccines shed the virus in their stool, which eventually ends up in sewage wastewater. Particularly in places where sanitation is poor, the virus can move from child to child, which actually helps protect the community, according to GPEI.

However, as it continues to circulate over the course of 12 to 18 months, the attenuated virus in the live oral vaccine strains can revert to virulence, circulate, infect, and paralyze “in places with low immunization rates.” These viruses are called circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus, or cVDPV.

Burundi declared a national emergency after confirming eight cases of the virus and five samples from environmental surveillance of wastewater, the World Health Organization (WHO) said in a statement. The country plans to implement a polio vaccination campaign in the coming weeks, aiming to vaccinate all eligible children, ages 0 to 7, against the virus. Burundi health authorities also plan to work with the WHO and GPEI to do risk assessments to determine the extent of the outbreak of the vaccine-derived virus. And they are increasing polio surveillance, with WHO employees collecting additional water samples and possibly opening new environmental surveillance sites.

Dr. Ananda Bandyopadhyay, deputy director for technology, research, and analytics on the Gates Foundation polio team, said, “We are disappointed. Any such outbreak is disappointing.”

Vaccines nOPV for types 1 and 3 poliovirus, called nOPV1 and nOPV3, are in clinical trials, according to EPGI. In an email to The Defender, Dr. Brian Hooker, Ph.D., P.E., Children’s Health Defense chief scientific officer, and professor of biology at Simpson University said, “It is tragic but not unexpected that the use of live virus Sabin vaccines would cause the spread of vaccine-derived polio given the propensity of these viruses to back-mutate into their paralytic form. It is even more alarming that the paralytic form is now circulating among the population of the Congo’s and Burundi’s children.”

The Gates Foundation is the topmost funder of polio initiatives worldwide. The Gates Foundation, in addition to funding the nPOV2 vaccine, GPEI, and the WHO, also funds Rotary International, UNICEF, Gavi, and the CDC Foundation. The Gates Foundation is also a funder of NPR and NPR’s blog, which have published numerous articles on VDPV2 and paved the way for Gates’ nPOV2 vaccine as the solution.

Critics have noted that Gates funding not only funnels money into this single issue but also requires commitments of funding, personnel, and other resources from recipient nations. As a result, the continued focus on polio is disproportionate to the need, diverting resources from other health issues and diseases. The Lancet published a critique of Gates back in 2009.

Despite the approval of the new nOPV2 vaccine by the WHO and the Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization (SAGE), it has been associated with vaccine-related polio outbreaks. Health officials in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Burundi, along with the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI), announced on Thursday that seven children were paralyzed by vaccine-derived polio linked to the nOPV2 polio vaccine developed by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The foundation, a GPEI partner, funded the development and clinical trials for the nOPV2 vaccine.

Burundi declared a national emergency after confirming eight cases of the virus and five samples from environmental surveillance of wastewater, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). The country plans to implement a polio vaccination campaign in the coming weeks, aiming to vaccinate all eligible children, ages 0 to 7, against the virus. Burundi health authorities also plan to work with the WHO and GPEI to do risk assessments to determine the extent of the outbreak of the vaccine-derived virus.

“We are disappointed,” said Dr. Ananda Bandyopadhyay, deputy director for technology, research and analytics on the Gates Foundation polio team. “Any such outbreak is disappointing,” he said, according to a Stat News report.

Vaccine-derived polio outbreaks are not a surprise with the nOPV2 vaccine, GPEI said. “While detection of these outbreaks is a tragedy for the families and communities affected, it is not unexpected with wider use of the vaccine,” it said on its website.

The oral vaccines, administered in much of Africa, the Middle East and parts of Asia, contain a live-but-weakened form of the polio virus modified to minimize its ability to paralyze. Children vaccinated with the live oral vaccines shed the virus in their stool, which eventually ends up in sewage wastewater. Particularly in places where sanitation is poor, the virus can move from child to child, which, GPEI said, is actually the point.

The viruses can move from person to person and “actually help protect the community” it says on its website. However, as it continues to circulate over the course of 12 to 18 months, the attenuated virus in the live oral vaccine strains can revert to virulence, circulate, infect and paralyze “in places with low immunization rates.” These viruses are called circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus, or cVDPV.

Afghanistan and Pakistan now report more cases of paralysis from vaccine-derived polio than from the wild virus, and there have been several outbreaks of vaccine-derived infections across Africa, with more than 1,000 children paralyzed in 2020 alone, according to a study in the BMJ. In 2022, 800 children developed paralytic polio from the vaccines.

The Gates Foundation is the topmost funder of polio initiatives worldwide. In April 2013, Bill Gates said that eradicating polio was his “top priority,” even though there had only been 19 cases worldwide that entire year at that point. Since Gates made that commitment, billions of dollars worldwide have been poured into the cause.

The Gates Foundation is one of several partners in the GPEI public-private partnership that also includes the WHO, UNICEF, the United Nations Children’s Fund, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Gavi and Rotary International. The Gates Foundation, in addition to funding the nPOV2 vaccine, GPEI and the WHO, also funds Rotary International, UNICEF, Gavi and the CDC Foundation.

Critics, including sociologist Linsey McGoey and many scientists working in low-income settings have noted that as money is lavished on polio, millions of children are left vulnerable to a slew of often deadly, preventable diseases.

According to Robert Fortner, a freelance science journalist, writing in the BMJ, polio funds from the Gates Foundation have led to local “brain drains,” with doctors, researchers, and practitioners moved into eradication and away from local and locally funded health priorities.

Even The Lancet published a similar critique of Gates back in 2009.

Dr. Richard Horton, editor-in-chief wrote in an editorial that, “Grants made by the Foundation do not reflect the burden of disease endured by those in deepest poverty,” and there is an “alarmingly poor correlation between the Foundation’s funding and childhood disease priorities.”

“There is also a serious anxiety about the transparency of the Foundation’s operation,” Horton said.

In the wake of the Gates Foundation’s role in the COVID-19 epidemic, many more people express similar concerns today.

The Gates Foundation’s influence is vast, and it is not just in the field of vaccines.

In the agricultural sector, for example, it has pushed for genetically modified crops, which some experts believe are dangerous and have adverse effects on the environment and human health.