AT A club meeting on January 21 Roy Barlow, president of the Rotary Club of Sidcup, revealed to the members that together with all Rotary Club presidents throughout the world he had received a communication from Doug-Kurn Lee, the Rotary International president.

In it he said that at the Rotary International Assembly in San Diego, USA, that day Bill Gates, who was there as a guest, had announced another huge grant to Polio Plus.

Rotary was instrumental in the setting up of a World Health Organisation project, Polio Plus, in 1986 to eradicate polio, and now it only remains in Afghanistan, Nigeria, India and Pakistan. The battle is 99 per cent won.

In 2007, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation put up the massive sum of $100m for the eradication of polio on the understanding Rotary International would match this amount dollar for dollar.

To date Rotarians have already committed more than $60 million toward this.

In this latest announcement, Mr Gates said his foundation has decided to increase its challenge grant by $255m – making a total of $355m.

By accepting this increase, Rotary also accepts the challenge to raise an additional $100m in matching funds by June 30, 2012.

The combined Rotary and Gates Foundation partnership’s commitment now totals $555m.

All of the resulting $555m will be spent in support of immunisation activities carried out by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) in polio-affected countries.

In another welcomed development that day, the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development pledged £100m and the German government is giving an additional €100m.

For further information, visit rotary.org