Speaker: Aruna Koushik, District Governor Nominee for District 6400. Topic: Polio Progress and Challenges in Pakistan.
Last meeting, Peter Hrastovec paid tribute to Megan Meloche, our archivist who passed away suddenly on October 22nd. Referring to her as “an angel that came to our rescue”, she helped our Club with the huge task of archiving and displaying 100 years worth of history for our centennial, including the creation of the incredible exhibit at the Chimczuk Museum. The PHF we were planning on presenting to her was given and displayed at her funeral. “May her memory be everlasting”.
Zak Shaw introduced our guest speaker, Aruna Koushik, member and past president of Rotary Club of Windsor-Roseland and District Governor Nominee for District 6400. Aruna is “extremely passionate about polio” and has undertaken eight National immunization trips. When she went on her first such trip to India in 2008 (along with Shari Cunningham and others), she explained that the acronym “PAIN” was popular: PAIN referred to the four countries, Pakistan, Afghanistan, India and Nigeria, where cases of polio were still prevalent. It was said that India would be the biggest challenge to be declared polio-free, because of the numerous languages, dialects and religions. How did India succeed? On National Immunization Day, there were 709,000 vaccination booths that vaccinated an unbelievable 172 million children in 1 day! India was declared polio-free in 2014. Aruna says that Nigeria is on the verge of being declared polio-free (will be certified in 6 months). We’re still focusing on Afghanistan and Pakistan. It’s also time to help by supporting polio survivors. “Let’s continue the fight!”.