When others prefer to take their Sunday mornings to sleep in or go to church, the Interact Club of Athabasca prefers to walk for ending polio.
About 20 Interact Club members and community folks showed up to walk the snow dusted, chilly streets of Athabasca Oct. 29 during the End Polio Now walk, aimed at raising funds to eradicate the remaining one percent disease worldwide.
“We are 99 per cent of the way there,” said Rotary member Jackie Hobal. “As of today, there are 12 active cases of polio. The end is in sight, so we are getting very excited as Rotarians.”
Hobal herself had the disease when she was four years old, which is one of the reasons she said she became involved in Rotary. She lost the use of her legs for four months, and it took about two years of rehabilitation before she recuperated.
“I’d like to ensure polio never cripples another child,” she said. “If we do not, polio is a very contagious and we always say, it’s just a plane ride away.”
Rehma Khan, Interact Club president, said the event was fairly successful, but it “could’ve been way better.”
“Interact-ers have been really busy lately, and so sometimes we don’t have the time to advertise and go out,” she said. “For a Sunday, when people want to sleep, the amount of people that showed up was pretty good, especially support we received from Rotarians and the fact (Athabasca-Sturgeon-Redwater MLA) Colin Piquette made an appearance. That was really beautiful as well.”
In total the Interact Club raised around $700, from Rotary contributions and their pancake breakfast before the walk began.
“I think if we did this as a long-term project it would’ve been way more successful. Then again, we have another project online for international,” Khan said. “It was a beginning project for our club. We were all motivated today; everyone was excited. The support I received from my club, everyone being there, was amazing.”
Piquette said the Interact Club is a “wonderful group of young people” and he was happy to support the walk.
“I hadn’t realized just what a role Rotary has had in eradicating polio, so that’s really impressive,” he said. “It’s always great to see young people organizing for a good purpose.”
According to a Rotary International’s end polio fact sheet, in the 1980s there were more than 350,000 children paralyzed by polio every year. There is no cure, but polio is preventable with a vaccine, and only three countries remain endemic.
“From my experience it’s really the quality of life. If you have polio you are destined to a life of being crippled or in an iron lung,” Hobal said. “It’s a pretty exciting time to be a Rotarian because of the polio campaign.”
