Working in health care has always been the most important thing in
social work. Without a massive worldwide effort, it would have been
impossible to rid humanity of smallpox. The other childhood disease that
international agencies, along with local health care service providers,
are trying to eradicate is polio.

In the developed world, this
disease has been eradicated by educating people about it and making sure
that every young child under the age of five is administered anti-polio
vaccine in the form of polio drops.

In the developing world,
state governments, international agencies and healthcare service
providers run massive campaigns to administer anti-polio vaccine free of
cost to every child. This is only possible by getting volunteers to go
from door to door and find out if there are any children in the
household who need to be given these drops. Without the help of
volunteers, running such a massive campaign would be impossible.

Trying
to rid the world of a disease is perhaps the best example of collective
social work. The manufacturers agree to provide the vaccine at no cost;
airlines and shipping companies provide transportation and delivery at
no cost. The government or organization running the campaign calls for
volunteers to administer the medicine. People in the poorest countries
volunteer to provide this service free of cost. So, no single
organization has to bear the cost of running such massive campaigns.

Students
are always eager to volunteer in such social work and step forward to
do it. This shows that people care for the well being of every person on
earth, regardless of their color, creed or ethnicity. To help a person
to live a better life is the basic objective of social work.

The
reason why the world is not free from polio is not due to lack of effort
on the part of worldwide organizations, but due to lack of education of
the recipients. In certain countries, religious groups have stopped
volunteers from administering the anti-polio vaccine, which has caused a
major setback to riding the world of this disease.

It is only
after people are educated about the usefulness of saving their children
from getting afflicted by this disease and they decide not to listen to
preachers and get anti-polio drops administered will the world be able
to heave a collective sigh of relief. To accomplish this will require a
massive voluntary effort, which can only be achieved through a massive
social effort.

{pixabay|100|campaign}