By: Christine Van Oyen

Polio
Polio is caused by a virus and is also known as Poliomyelitis. It created long life disabilities for people by paralyzing individuals through atrophied limbs. Sometimes, people died from it, but these are the most severe cases. Polio has been around since ancient times, but it mainly struck from the late 1800s to the mid- 1900s. This virus was most devastating in the United States during the 20th century. The first big epidemic struck in the New York City area in 1916. It left 6,000 dead and 27,000 paralyzed! Polio has many symptoms, we have developed vaccines, and machines have been created to treat people with severe forms. Polio usually comes when there is warm weather. When polio was at its peak, many parents made their kids stay inside so they wouldnt get sick. Playgrounds, swimming pools, and movie theaters were empty during this time. Polio is highly contagious. 80% of those who get polio are under the age of five. The disease is spread by drinking or swimming in contaminated water, since it is a water born disease. Polio enters the body orally and goes to the intestines. From here, it can also spread to the central nervous system which damages the nerve tissue. Polio uses cells to reproduce. The virus attaches to the membrane. Next, it makes a hole in the membrane and injects genetic material. This material takes over the cell and makes copies of the virus. The cell bursts when it cannot contain all of these copies, spreading it to other cells where the process starts again. Until

the disease was fully understood, we didnt know its cause, cure, or how to stop it from spreading. The symptoms of polio do not always result in paralyzation. There are four main levels of polio symptoms. Those are inapparent, abortive, non-paralysis, and paralytic. These are listed from least severe to most severe. When you have inapparent polio, you may experience a sore throat, headache, or fever. If you have a case of abortive polio, you may experience vomiting, abdominal pain, constipation, or diarrhea along with those symptoms from inapparent polio cases. If you have non-paralysis polio, you may experience these past symptoms as well as a stiff neck or sore limbs. Paralytic polio is the worst. This is also the rarest and results in paralyzation. Polio also can affect the brain and spinal cord.

Polio was most severe in wealthy countries. Before modern sanitation and plumbing in countries, babies were exposed and protected by antibodies. However, the sanitation improvements in the 20th century changed this. Infants were no longer exposed to the virus and were not immune to it. When they got older and were exposed to polio, children often got a more severe form. Polio can only be prevented; there is no cure for it. Vaccines have made polio decrease over the years. Jonas Salk invented a vaccine that eradicated polio. He helped to defeat the disease. There are two main vaccines and those are the Sabin and the Salk vaccine. The Sabin vaccine is a liquid and the Salk vaccine is injected. This modern medicine has made polio rare in the United States. Some parents are opposing polio vaccination because approximately six babies a year contract paralytic polio from the

vaccine. One in five children is not vaccinated. These vaccines are the main reason why the number of people who have polio has decreased over the years. When polio got so bad, people were put into iron lungs if they had trouble breathing. The iron lung was invented by Philip Drinker and was introduced in 1927. What is an iron lung? Iron lungs consisted of a cylindrical metal tank. The patient laid on a bed with the tank over them. The large tank had holes in the sides so therapists could easily reach their patients. The iron lung was connected to a pump, which created a vacuum, filling the patients lungs with air. People with a bad case of polio spent their days inside one of these terrifying machines. Some famous people had polio. Franklin D. Roosevelt was one of them. President Roosevelt said, First symptoms of the illness appeared in August 1921 when I was thoroughly tired from overwork. I first had a chill in the evening which lasted practically all night. The following morning the muscles of the right knee appeared weak and by afternoon I was unable to support my weight on my right leg. That evening the left knee began to weaken also and by the following morning I was unable to stand up... by the end of the third day practically all muscles from chest down were involved. From 1921-1922 Franklin D. Roosevelt regained use of his upper body and arms, but his legs remained paralyzed. He was a man of determination and set a goal to walk again. With leg braces and crutches, FDR could walk. Out of more than 35,000 pictures of him, only two show him in his wheelchair. In 1938, FDR established the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis.

Another famous person who had polio was Wilma Rudolph. Wilma was born on June 23, 1940, in Tennessee. She was the 20th of 22 children and weighed four and a half pounds when she was born. Ms. Rudolph was not expected to live and was sick all the time growing up. She had measles, mumps, chicken pox, scarlet fever, appendicitis, and double pneumonia. But, out of all of this, polio was the hardest. Wilma contracted polio at the age of four. There was segregation in the 1940s so since she was African American, there was only one doctor in town to care for her. Polio crippled her left leg and she got a brace for it. Wilma Rudolph said, I was nine and a half years old when I first took off the brace... Ill never forget it. I went to church, and I walked in without the brace... Id say it was one of the most important moments of my life. She was officially over polio at age 12. After that, she practiced for track. At age 16, she competed at the 1956 Olympics in Australia and won a bronze medal for the 4x100- meter relay! She competed again in 1960 and won gold medals for the 100-meter dash, 200-meter dash and in a relay! She was the first African American woman to win three gold medals. Wilma Rudolph went from not being able to walk, to the fastest women in the world. In conclusion, polio has left many paralyzed and even dead. The symptoms vary greatly depending on how serious the case is. The Salk and the Sabin vaccine have played a big part in decreasing the number of individuals who have polio. Some of the treatment can be scary and intimidate patients. However, most importantly, the number of victims has decreased tremendously.