May 7 – Leon Hirsh, Past District Governor and Polio Chair, The Fight for the Oral Polio Vaccine

MEET OUR SPEAKER 

 Mention Rotary and its good works and it is likely that the PolioPlus campaign will be the first thing to come to mind.  The PolioPlus campaign was initiated by Rotary International back in 1985, before many of our current members were born.  Because it largely involves activities geographically removed from us, it would be easy to lose sight of the program’s continued importance and needs. Today’s speaker, Leon Hirsh, is here to ensure that doesn’t happen. 

 Past District Governor Hirsh was born in Cincinnati, Ohio.  He is a graduate of the Kentucky Military Institute and Transylvania University.  Leon has lived in Pensacola, Florida since 1980.  He remains a practicing financial advisor and has spent the lion’s share of his career with legacy A.G. Edwards and Sons and now Benjamin F. Edwards and Co.  

 Leon’s Rotary career spans forty-two years with Pensacola North Rotary, forty of them with perfect attendance. He served as District 6940’s District Governor in 2015-16, is the A.G. Trainer for District 6940, was the A.G. Trainer at Florida PETS in 2016 -18, and served five years as the district’s Polio Programs chair.  Having been a Rotary Leadership Institute class facilitator since 2009, he is certified to lead the RLI graduate classes and also has trained many of RLI’s discussion leaders. 

 His program, The Fight for the Oral Polio Vaccine, has been presented to 140 clubs in seven states. 

 What is polio? 

Polio, or poliomyelitis, is a paralyzing and potentially deadly infectious disease that most commonly affects children under the age of five. The virus spreads from person to person, typically through contaminated water. It can then attack the nervous system. 

Our goal 

Rotary has been working to eradicate polio for more than forty-five years. Our goal of ridding the world of this disease is closer than ever. 

Rotary’s first polio project was to vaccinate children in the Philippines in 1979. Inspired by that successful vaccination campaign, Rotary went on to become a founding partner of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative in 1988, which has reduced polio cases around the world by 99.9 percent. 

Thanks to the generosity and commitment of our members, Rotary has contributed more than US$2.9 billion in PolioPlus grants and countless volunteer hours to protect more than 3 billion children in 122 countries from this disease. Rotary’s advocacy efforts have played a role in decisions by governments to contribute more than $11 billion to the effort. 

Today, polio remains endemic only in Afghanistan and Pakistan. But it’s crucial to continue working to keep other countries polio-free. If all eradication efforts stopped today, within 10 years, polio could paralyze as many as 200,000 children each year. 

• Taken in part from the Rotary International Website