Part 3 in a 4-part series
Until every child is safe
In 1952, polio struck a new victim every 10 minutes in the United States. It was every parent's nightmare. Vaccines were introduced and cases plummeted. But the disease still exists. And organizations say an outbreak is only a plane ride away. This week, The Star is sharing the stories of those who suffered from polio, what support exists and profiles of those who are fighting to raise awareness and end polio forever.
What to learn more? Local Rotarians will present “Mount Kilimanjaro – Six Days Above the Clouds,” the story of the Rotary fundraising climb to eradicate polio at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday (Nov. 20) at Mildred H. Keeter Auditorium at Cleveland Community College . Michael Cheng, Allen Langley, Tom McNichol, Mark Patterson and Bryan Baker will share their experiences of climbing the highest free-standing mountain in the world. This event is free and open to the public.
Polio is a crippling and potentially fatal infectious disease. There is no cure, but there are safe and effective vaccines. The strategy to eradicate polio is therefore based on preventing infection by immunizing every child until transmission stops and the world is polio-free.
Polio in the U.S.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, an average of more than 35,000 cases were reported during the late 1940s and early 1950s. At the height of the epidemic, nearly 60,000 cases with more than 3,000 deaths were reported in the United States. With the introduction of inactivated poliovirus vaccine (IPV) developed by Dr. Jonas Salk in 1955, the number of cases rapidly declined to fewer than 2,500 cases in 1957.
By 1965, only 61 cases of paralytic polio were reported.
Polio (poliomyelitis) is a highly infectious disease caused by a virus. It invades the nervous system and can cause irreversible paralysis in a matter of hours. Polio is spread through person-to-person contact. When a child is infected with wild poliovirus, the virus enters the body through the mouth and multiplies in the intestine. Most people infected with the poliovirus have no signs of illness and are never aware they have been infected. These symptomless people carry the virus in their intestines and can “silently” spread the infection to thousands of others before the first case of polio paralysis emerges. For this reason, WHO considers a single confirmed case of polio paralysis to be evidence of an epidemic – particularly in countries where very few cases occur.
Most infected people (90 percent) have no symptoms or very mild symptoms and usually go unrecognized. In others, initial symptoms include fever, fatigue, headache, vomiting, stiffness in the neck and pain in the limbs.
Acute flaccid paralysis: One in 200 infections leads to irreversible paralysis, usually in the legs.
Bulbar polio: More extensive paralysis, involving the trunk and muscles of the thorax and abdomen, can result in quadriplegia.
About 40 percent of people who survive paralytic polio may develop additional symptoms 15-40 years after the original illness. These symptoms – called post-polio syndrome – include new progressive muscle weakness, severe fatigue and pain in the muscles and joints.
Sources: Global Polio Eradication Initiative, www.polioeradication.org; and World Health Organization, www.who.int