New York detects vaccine-derived polio case

Health officials in New York  announced a vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 case, which involves a person in Rockland County, prompting a vaccination push for the unimmunized and those who aren’t fully protected and a plea for healthcare providers to look for more cases. The detection marks the first appearance of polio in the United States since 2013, and though the case doesn’t involved wild poliovirus type 1, the development is still worrying, given expanding spread of vaccine-related virus in populations with immunization gaps. The case follows a recent alert in the United Kingdom, which detected the same type of virus in London wastewater, raising the strong possibility that it is spreading in people there. Case detected in NYC metro area In a statement, the New York State Department of Health said sequencing at the state’s public health lab, confirmed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), showed that the virus is a...