Poliovirus
1. Why has Poliovirus not been eradicated to date?
Several reasons have historically led to that poliovirus not being eradicated. Some of them are listed as follows:
1) People’s misconception about Poliovirus.
2) Insecurity within the country, especially, in the countries in which wild polioviruses have been transmitting endemic.
3) Poor health system. Also, the poliovirus vaccine is more complicated to administer compared to some other vaccines such as the smallpox vaccine. For instance, the oral poliovirus vaccine needs to be kept refrigerated and administrated multiple times.
4) Mistrust of the West and their vaccination programs in afflicted areas. For instance, 8 poliovirus vaccinators were killed in northern Afghanistan in February 2022 which forced the United Nations to stop the vaccination in two provinces. The following month, another vaccination worker was killed in northwestern Pakistan. Since 2012, more than 70 vaccinators have been targeted in Pakistan as well.
5) Underscoring the poliovirus dangers. This resulted in reemerging of the virus in southern Africa in 2021. Also, several vaccine-derived cases appeared in the United States and Israel in 2022. Furthermore, the war in Ukraine disrupted the government's efforts to prevent the virus outbreak in the west side of the country.
6) Undermining poliovirus vaccination campaigns by misinformation. For instance, a mob in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan burned a healthcare facility in 2019 after a rumor that vaccinated children had fallen ill due to the expiration of their vaccine doses.
Sample Solution
Poliovirus has not been eradicated to date due to several factors. First, it is a very contagious virus and can spread quickly in areas with poor sanitation and access to healthcare. Second, poliovirus is difficult to diagnose because its symptoms are similar to those of other illnesses. Third, the vaccine used in immunization campaigns is not 100% effective so there are still some people who remain susceptible to the disease even after vaccination. Finally, many countries have limited resources for immunization campaigns which makes it more difficult for them to reach their target populations and eliminate the virus completely.
Oviposition, or the laying of eggs, is broken down into pre-oviposition and post-oviposition. In this experiment we observed pre-oviposition factors using the model species Callosobrachus maculatus, commonly known as the bean beetle. Small and large lima beans were used to test whether or not bean beetles had a preferred site size for oviposition. We hypothesized that if a preference was shown, the majority of eggs will be oviposited on the larger lima beans when compared to small lima beans. To do this we placed 15 small and 15 large lima beans in 3 petri dishes, then added 3 female and 2 male bean beetles in each and waited 2 weeks to allow fertilization and oviposition. Because our subject was exposed to both sizes of beans throughout the experiment, we interpreted our results by observing the number of eggs laid on each individual bean. From our observations we calculated the mean, standard deviation, standard error of mean, and for statistical purposes, ran a t-test. We found our results to be statistically significant, therefore we rejected the null hypothesis. From this we can concur that C. maculatus prefers smaller sized beans for oviposition.