They say there’s always light at the end of the tunnel. After a long, courageous battle against a terrible disease, India is finally set to be completely Polio free within the next three months. Previously described by experts as an impossible task, this occasion will mark one of the greatest public health achievements of all time.

Polio has been a serious healthcare challenge to India for a long time. Having been considered a global epidemic since the 1940s, by 1988, when the WHO passed a resolution for its eradication, about a thousand people were being infected by the virus everyday. According to Rotary International’s India Polio Plus Committees estimates, India accounted for almost half these infections with 450 people being infected daily. Between 1988 and 2009, the number of Polio epidemic countries dropped from 125 to 4. But India was still home to half the infected.

This once-impossible task required the right people, organizations, and institutions to ensure its success. These requirements were fulfilled by a strategic partnership between the Indian Government and international organizations. Together they managed to raise more than $2 billion, with a team of 2 million vaccinators who targeted to reach more than 170 million children a year. This was coupled with an astute marketing program to create awareness about these campaigns and the necessities of Polio drops.

Integral to this campaign for awareness were school and university teachers who sought to inculcate in every family the awareness of this epidemic; religious leaders, who campaigned ferociously for their communities to be free of myths and false stories associated with the disease; and Bollywood actors, who helped spread the word to the masses. Mr. Amitabh Bachchan, arguably India’s most popular actor, deserves a special mention. His baritone voice saying, “Do Boond Zindagi Ke” (“2 drops of life”) resonated in every household, print media, radio and movie theaters changing the face of the campaign, and even earning him recognition from the WHO. In a study conducted by the Social and Rural Research Institute, it has been reported that in low socio-economic categories, 73.6 percent of guardians with children under the age of five could recall the polio TV ad featuring Mr. Bachchan.

Along with celebrities, religious leaders have a unique opportunity to mobilize masses towards the eradication of such a disease. The primordial nature of religion makes these leaders the most effective mediums of change in a context like India. Through public campaigns and statements, religious leaders were able to invoke a moral imperative to fulfill the duty to society hence serving its most vulnerable members. These leaders publicly supported immunization campaigns, nullifying many opposing religious myths about vaccinations and about the disease itself. Other, non-religious stereotypes about immunizations were dealt with by increasing the number of female vaccinators to tackle gender parity as well as freedom of expression.

What cannot be forgotten are the high levels of political commitment and administrative skill required for a campaign targeting such large numbers. Policy makers at the local, state and central levels of government should be lauded for their commitment to the cause and its success. Surveillance techniques were developed in both registered and unregistered slums all over the country, giving real-time updates on every case. Systemized surveillance and government accountability are key for any such initiative. On the ground, the realization that sheer labour and hard work was the only way to eradicate this disease was a key step to the campaign’s success, as public health workers literally went door to door in polio-affected areas to ensure that no child was missed.

Strategies were formulated such that focus lay on Uttar Pradesh and Bihar – two states riddled with poverty – as well as on migrant laborers who were tracked and immunized. Looking at the bigger picture, an undertaking of this magnitude would not be possible without the institutions that support today’s high levels of international cooperation. The mission would not have succeeded without the continual support and interest of international health organizations and philanthropic organizations such as the Gates Foundation. The coordination of such commendable organizations, gives a much needed private sector boost to government activities and plans.

India showed the world how a responsible partnership of governments and corporates teamed with a simple marketing plan could achieve such an amazing result. There is reason to be hopeful for the future if this model and surveillance system can be replicated to fight diseases like Tuberculosis, a major obstruction to India’s human resource development.

Even though efforts have started, it is yet to be seen if such a project’s infrastructure can be used in the contexts of countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nigeria where Polio seems to have been politicized, with different parties spreading rumors against immunization and some even going as far as calling it ‘an evil Western force’.

In these countries, the role of religion and gender to tackle such an issue is of a bigger magnitude. They key lies in training Islamic clerics and other community leaders to propagate immunization against the disease. The primary obstacle lies in convincing these leaders themselves about the potential of a collaboration between religious leadership and International Health organizations. Here lies one of the main reasons for the campaigns failure in Pakistan and Afghanistan where extremist groups such as the Tehrik-i-Taliban are seeking to exploit the fears of the impoverished by hatching conspiracy theories about a Western plot. There have been countless cases of the Taliban attacking female volunteers and vaccinators.

In such cases, the government needs to play a larger role in the realm of security for these volunteers, vaccinators as well as leaders who are propagating these immunization marches. In cases like Nigeria, community dialogue has been much more effective than political advocacy as people continue to be disillusioned by the government.

India’s last polio case was reported in January 2013, and if all goes well, soon the nation will wear the proud crown of a Polio Free state.

WRITTEN BY KSHITIJ SHARAN

Kshitij is an Economics and Political Science student at McGill University and Fellow of The Global Education and Leadership Foundation, originally from Delhi, India.