When the program began, the disease still threatened 60% of the world's population and killed every fourth victim. Eradication of poliomyelitis is within reach. Since the launch by WHO and its partners of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative in 1988, infections have fallen by 99%, and about five million people have escaped paralysis. Between 2000 and 2008, measles deaths dropped worldwide by almost 78%, and some regions have resolved to eliminate the disease.