Everyday, the United States faces new threats to public health and well being, and everyday, medicine advances. Updated medical procedures have created a safer, healthier nation than years past. Some of the most important advancements and ideas were created not that long ago. An era of extreme change of the medical world in the United States was the outbreak of poliomyelitis in the 1930s and 1940s. Three decades of research, treatment, and fighting an epidemic led doctors to take a different approach to medicine. This era produced new inventions, new sanitation concerns, and new vaccines. It also stressed the importance of maintaining personal health, and the importance of receiving all vaccines. These medical advancements include the invention …show more content…
All three strands attack the nervous system and the digestive tract, making fecal matter and vomit infectious. Polio may also be contracted through contaminated food or water. Due to the highly infectious nature of the poliovirus, epidemics were rampant in poor communities and among young children attending school. Epidemics swept the nation during the 1930s, 20s and 10s. People lived in fear of their children contracting such a harmful illness. Schools and swimming pools were closed in order to prevent the spread of the virus (Last). Mothers were warned against breastfeeding, as the virus had the potential to be spread through breast milk …show more content…
Bodian that Dr. Jonas Salk was able to invent the polio vaccine. Dr. Salk’s background working with the influenza virus also contributed to his invention (PBS). When Salk became the head of the Virus Research Lab in Pittsburgh, he began to investigate the poliovirus and worked towards a custom vaccine to combat the disease (PBS). Dr. Salk used the method of Ender’s team to reproduce polio cells on non living tissues, and tested various chemicals against the virus. He quickly found that formaldehyde kills the polio virus, but still allows for the human body to produce a response of antibodies (PBS). The inactivated virus was severely weakened enough to enter the human body without causing polio, and generated the proper immune defense needed to ward off polio. Dr. Bodian had confirmed in 1953 that antibodies would be pertinent in stopping polio within the bloodstream, and this was very important to the overall success of Salk’s
Polio is a deadly virus that hit america in the 1930s (Franklin Roosevelt founds...N.P.). Franklin Roosevelt founds March of Dimes Polio is also known to be a crippling disease, which affected Franklin Delano Roosevelt at the age of 39. But, on January the third he created a foundation for a cure for polio called March of Dimes(Franklin Roosevelt founds March of Dimes N.P.).10 years later he created a foundation,Warm Springs Foundation, which focus entirely on the treatment of people with polio(Franklin Roosevelt founds March of Dimes N.P.). In 1934, a business, Henry Doherty donated $25,000 to establish a series of birthday balls(Franklin Roosevelt founds March of Dimes N.P.). In the first year they raised 1 million dollars off
In 1947, the NFIP was looking for someone capable in researching a polio vaccine, and there was no candidate better for this research than Dr. Jonas Salk.7P Salk was a very experienced researcher; he played a crucial role in the development of influenza vaccines during World War II, and also had a deep understanding of the immune system and antibodies.8B Additionally, Salk also worked to treat multiple sclerosis, cancer, and HIV.9C Together, in the 8 years that followed after recruitment, Salk and the NFIP would take a stand against polio by successfully trying to put an end to polio through the use of
One of the areas that we have greatly improved in has been our medical studies. With the improvements in our medical studies came vaccines. The first recorded vaccinated happened in 1774 by a farmer named Benjamin Jesty (The Dorest Page). Benjamin was an ordinary farmer, but during the summer there was an outbreak of smallpox (The Dorest Page). Small pox was a dangerous disease that sometimes ended with death. “Benjamin reasoned that if dairymaids who caught cowpox accidentally were immune to smallpox, then someone who caught cowpox deliberately should be equally immune. He therefore resolved to infect his family with cowpox with a
One of the worst polio epidemics to hit the United States was in 1916 in the heart of New York City. It infected 9,000 just in the city and kept spreading throughout the states to infect over 27,000. It left
Poliomyelitis, commonly known as “Polio”, is an acute motor disease caused by the poliovirus that targets the anterior horn cells of the human spinal cord, and in severe cases results in acute flaccid paralysis (Alberta Health and Wellness, 2011), which can progress to permanent paralysis. It mainly affects children under the age of five, although individuals of any age may contract it (World Health Organization, 2013 [C]). Historical outbreaks, most prominently the 1916 and 1952 epidemics in the United States, led to the development of two separate vaccines: Inactivated Polio Vaccine (IPV), and Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV). Although polio has seen over a 99% decrease in cases since 1988 and has largely been eradicated in the
When the polio virus exploded across the US in 1952, the newly formed health organizations (CDC, WHO, UN Foundation) rallied together alongside private foundations (Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis) and fought back with a new tool: public awareness campaigns that introduced the idea of preventing diseases by following hygienic routines (Oshinsky
If you were to question any public health professional as to what the greatest biomedical achievement of the last century was, they would likely struggle to find a more influential achievement than the development of vaccines. The struggling breaths of whooping cough, the horrendous birth defects caused by rubella, and the clunky braces used by children paralyzed by polio, all are only thought of as occurrences of the past by many Americans. Many find it hard to believe that less than a century ago; the infant mortality rate was a massive 20 percent (Alexandra, Markel, 2005). Fortunately, many of these devastating diseases have been eradicated because of the development and widespread use of vaccines. The history of vaccines is, however, very complex. The growth widespread use of vaccines requires a balance of scientific ingenuity and social acceptance. Vaccines historically have, and continue to, cause strong scientific, social, and cultural reactions.
In 1976, Dr. Jonah Salk, creator of the killed-virus vaccine used in the 1950s, testified that the live-virus vaccine (used almost exclusively from the 1960s-2000s in the U.S.) was the “principle if not sole cause” of all reported polio cases since 1961 in the United States.
Immunizations have lowered the morbidity rate over the course of many years. Before vaccines were introduced, during 1900 through 1904, an average of 48,164 cases and 2528 deaths were caused by both severe and mild forms of smallpox in the United States. After the smallpox vaccine was introduced, the disease ceased to stop and the last case to ever be reported was in 1929. Getting vaccinated against the smallpox actually eradicated the disease, meaning it has been wiped out. Next, in 1951- 1954, on average, 16,316 polio cases and 1879 polio deaths were reported each year. Once the polio vaccine was introduced, less that 1000 cases were reported in 1962. As of 1991, wild-type polio viruses have been eliminated from the Western Hemisphere. But
Because of advances in medical science, your child can be protected against more diseases than ever before. Some diseases that once injured or killed thousands of children, have been eliminated completely and others are close to extinction primarily due to safe and effective vaccines. Polio is one example of the great impact that vaccines had have in the United States (Five). Polio was once America’s most-feared disease, causing death and paralysis across the country, but today, thanks to vaccination, there are no reports of polio in the
Some of the greatest accomplishments to come out of the twenty-first century are vaccines. They were designed to stop major epidemics from wiping out the populations. As so many have in history. Nevertheless, numerous parents are now opting out of getting their children vaccinated under personal beliefs and religious. This is causing older illnesses to become more prominent in current times. When considering vaccines think about the history of vaccines, the potential risk of not getting vaccinated, and the effectiveness.
Two observations led to the development of vaccines: Smallpox survivors became immune to the disease and controlled exposure lead to milder outbreaks. Variolation was the first method used to immunize someone against smallpox. Around 1,000 A.D., Chinese doctors began grinding smallpox scabs into a powder substance that they then pur into the noses of each patient. Also around 1,000 A.D. in India, doctors would dip needles into blisters of smallpox patients
Polio or poliomyelitis is a viral infection that normally affects kids below the age of 5years old. This childhood killer disease has been around for my centuries. Polio was first discovered my Jacob Heine in 1840 and later identified by Karl Landsteiner as poliomyelitis caused by polio virus from the enteric family of viruses. The polio virus is acquired through oral-fecal transmission. The Latin name simply means grey matter, and it is meaning inflation. There is a more serious form that can spread to the brain called polio encephalitis. The world over have cerebrated for the almost eradication of polio through improved sanitation, advancement in access to clean drinking water and aggressive vaccination campaign. There are challenges in recent years because the polio virus has re-emerged in places like Syria, Cameroun, Pakistan and Nigeria among others. In a CNN cable television report the cases of polio in Syria in particular is alarming, there are 100s of new polio cases due to failure of the health system because of a raging civil, sectarian war. The case of Pakistan and Nigeria are of religious extremism where they belief the vaccines are causing harm to their children. These are challenges faced with the eradication of this deadly childhood disease to name a few. The problem is not limited to only these countries, even in the United States of America are some Christian extremist who belief this vaccines makes their children sick. The world health organization (WHO),
The first Polio epidemic took place in the 1900’s. It began showing up in Europe and the United States. During the first half of the 20th century the disease quickly spread through Europe, North America, Australia and New Zealand. By 1952 the polio outbreak
Polio is virus infection that occurs in the throat and intestines through environmental contaminations such as water by stool and feces [7]. The virus in most cases occurs in children aged five and under and leads to the invasion of the nervous system which can cause irreversible paralysis [12]. In 1988 a proposal called Global Polio Eradication Initiative was put forward by the World Health Assembly to eradicate the disease which included partners such as “WHO, Rotary International, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), UNICEF, and supported by key partners including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation” [12]. Since this proposal, cases of polio have dropped from 350,000 yearly to a global low of 223 cases in 2012 [1, 7]. Since 2012 “only parts of three countries in the world remain endemic for the disease–the smallest geographic area in history” [12]. However, with only one percent of the world infected with polio, it reappeared in countries and cases increased by seventy percent [1]. Canadians should not take the matter lightly because the course of the disease can change quickly. In an interview