Tunji Funsho - one of Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential People 2020.
Firstly I would like to congratulate Bulletin Editor Kishor, President Di and all other contributors who have made this year's bulletin so newsworthy and readable.
One article in particular springs to mind regarding RotarianTunji Funsho, and his prominent role in the fight to eradicate the polio virus.
Unfortunately RI President Holger Knaack's link re Tunji was in Spanish, but I am including the article from a November issue of Time magazine entitled "Ending Polio" -
Unfortunately RI President Holger Knaack's link re Tunji was in Spanish, but I am including the article from a November issue of Time magazine entitled "Ending Polio" -
It's not often an entire continent eradicates a disease, but on August 25, 2020, that happened when Nigeria was declared polio-free, clearing the virus from its last redoubt in all of Africa. The person who did more than any other to drive polio to continent-wide extinction was Dr. Funji Tunsho, a former cardiologist and now the chair of Rotary International's polio-eradication program in Nigeria.
Funsho could have retired years ago, but in 2013, with polio still paralyzing children across Nigeria, he decided to step up to lead the Rotarians' effort.
Together with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the WHO, the CDC and UNICEF, Funsho and Rotary helped lead National Immunization Days, getting millions of doses of polio vaccine to children in cities and villages around the nation.
They also sponsored health-education initiatives at community centres, mosques and even birthday parties.
This summer, the country marked four years without a case of wild polio, qualifying it for its polio-free certification, leaving Afghanistan and Pakistan as the only places in the world in which polio remains endemic.
I was delighted to read that Rotary, through this Time article, was finally getting due acknowledgement for our role in this global celebration.
Roger Taylor