The New York State Health Department advises New Yorkers to get a polio shot before traveling to Israel, where several children have recently tested positive for the disease.
In a statement released on Friday, he referred to the four cases diagnosed in Safed, in the north of the country, a year after a small outbreak of polio in Israel.
He advised New Yorkers “to get vaccinated” before traveling to Israel or other polio-affected countries.
New York City health authorities are in contact with their Israeli counterparts “to provide a coordinated response,” the statement said, adding that travelers should adhere to guidelines from the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC).
Outside of Israel, the statement noted that the CDC had recommended the same caution before traveling to the UK, Ukraine, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Indonesia, Nigeria, Ivory Coast and several other Central African countries.
Poliomyelitis is a viral disease that mainly affects children and can lead to disability, paralysis and even death.
Nowadays, children are normally vaccinated against poliomyelitis, which is an effective preventive measure, but distrust of vaccines allows the disease to reappear sporadically.
The epidemic that hit Israel last March, which came after 33 years of disappearance of the virus in the country, prompted a new vaccination campaign.
Since then, Israel is again on the list of the World Health Organization (WHO) Poliomyelitis Eradication Initiative, which identifies countries affected by epidemic episodes, even though the country had been declared polio-free. poliomyelitis in 1988.
Following the cases detected this month, the Ministry of Health mentioned the presence of traces of poliomyelitis in wastewater, recalling that more than 150,000 Israeli children were not vaccinated against the virus.