The worldwide success of polio vaccines and the successful eradication of smallpox made the World Health Organization (WHO) confident the disease could be completely eradicated. WHO founded the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) in 1988, and with the support of public and private donors, like the Gates Foundation and Rotary International, millions of children have been vaccinated and the world is almost free of polio. Despite these milestones, and elimination in many nations, a small number of cases continue to delay the final declaration of eradication.

Polio’s persistence is due in part to civil unrest in several developing countries, growing vaccine hesitancy, and vaccine-associated paralytic polio (VAPP). Because of this, the eradication campaign, while continuing, has drawn critical attention.

NYU Langone’s Project on Polio Eradication, Ethics, and Policy is led by Arthur L. Caplan, PhD, and examines the GPEI campaign, documenting the history of polio eradication, the choices made, costs and benefits, and the ethical issues it confronts today. The goal is to shape the next stages of polio eradication policy with ethically grounded recommendations that align with the values of global public health as well as any future efforts at using vaccination to eradicate diseases. This one-year project is funded by the Gates Foundation.

Project on Polio Eradication, Ethics, and Policy Team

Arthur L. Caplan, PhD
David M. Oshinsky, PhD
Nathaniel Mamo, MA
Dhriti Jagadish
Felicia Pasadyn