Imagine living with the fear of catching a disease that could paralyze you for the rest of your life. Generations of people in the United States lived with the fear of polio, and worldwide people still contend with that fear today. The development of the polio vaccine is one of the most renowned achievements in modern medicine, and thanks to its development it is vanishingly rare to see someone in an iron lung in the United States today. Huge amounts of resources went into the defeat of the disease, but today it is making slight inroads back into public discourse as unvaccinated people contract the disease once more here in the United States. Join us as we explore the fascinating history of polio.
Submitted by Patricia Brunetto on March 28, 2023