Antique polio vaccine the last living polio victim

Turboomni

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Not the last polio victim of course but one of the last on an iron lung. This poor guy got it at the age of 6 in the early 1950's. A very early vaccine in the mid 1950's worked to the point of polio extinction, at least here in the US but elsewhere in the world kids still get Polio today because of lack of vaccine . I am sure the science of vaccines is much better today than 60+years ago.

 
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I lost two brothers to Polio in 1953, the year I was born. They were ages 9 and 7. I have pictures and news articles about them around here somewhere.
 
My sister had polio, contracting it in the summer of 1955. She was 19 at the time, 18 years older than me.

She worked through it, the only thing noticeable when all was done was a slight limp and that was really only when she was tired. My dad said he never saw anyone work as hard as her when she was doing PT. He built a table for her workouts that could hold the overhead springs that she worked her legs against. It was something the therapist marveled at. Later on, my Dad never being one to waste anything, he cut the overhead stuff off and it became the garage workbench.

My sister was good for many years, but when she got into her mid 60's, the Post Polio syndrome began to affect her quite a bit. She lost her husband to cancer about this time too. It got worse and worse until she passed at almost 80. As she approached death, I really think she was looking at it as a relief to her pain.

The reluctance of people to vaccinate their children against this horrible disease baffles me. I always look at this stuff as "risk versus reward" and the risk is very, very small and the facts are much different than what the parents are basing their decisions on. No real science in what they've read or heard, just some nonsense blended with some lies. With the influx of unvaccinated people coming across our borders, it makes even less sense.
 
I've known about polio and iron lungs, but I've never seen a person in one. That is just horrible.
 
My dad always claimed he had a touch of it. His right leg was very skinny compared to his left. I don't know if that is possible. It was very noticable if he was wearing shorts, literally no meat on the right leg from approximately the knee down.
I have to say these people that don't believe in getting their kids vaccinated are dummies. With current events of the last year, I hope schools start refusing people who's kids are not vaccinated, fine home school your kids.
 
quote" Is this one of the "ok" controversial posts where we shame people? I'm not on that much, so just checking." quote


That was not my intent at all. I want to see historical facts , not political influenced garbage. I was curious how long vaccinations existed and inoculations. I was very surprised about the knowledge they had in George Washington's time. I thought it interesting and factual without politics. Data from history. Just out of curiosity when we were kids in the 1960's how many vaccinations did we have? I remember Polio, tetanus the others escape me.....
 
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That was not my intent at all. I was curious how long vaccinations existed and inoculations. I was very surprised about the knowledge they had in George Washington's time. I thought it interesting and factual without politics. Data from history. Just out of curiosity when we were kids in the 1960's how many vaccinations did we have? I remember Polio, tetanus the others escape me.....
Whooping cough was a big one too.

I remember getting my polio vaccination along with boosters and the oral vaccine too.

Chicken pox almost killed me in1992. They have a vaccine for that now. I wish they had one before, that was a terrible experience for me and took the better part of year to get over it enough to feel good. I don't think I ever came back as healthy as I was before though.

I do annual flu shots and I believe it has helped. I also have done shingles and pneumonia and yes, I weighed the risk versus reward, set aside the stupid politics on both sides, and got the Covid shot too. That's looking out for number one.
 
I had the chickenpox as a kid as well as measles. Man big John Chicken Pox as an Adult is really serious stuff. I was instructed by my doctor to get a pneumonia and shingles shots. I do remember the kids would have get together to get measles and maybe chicken pox too. If I remember correctly my doc asked if I ever had chicken pox because it is related to shingles.
 
These 12 Vaccines Saved the Most Lives – 24/7 Wall St.

12 vaccines in history that saved the most lives,

Smallpox
> Estimated deaths before widespread immunity: 300 million in the 20th century
> Vaccine introduced: 1796
> Vaccine impact: 5 million lives a year saved

Pertussis (Whooping cough)
> Estimated deaths before widespread immunity: 160,000 a year worldwide
> Vaccine introduced: 1914
> Vaccine impact: 160,700 lives a year saved

Tetanus (Lockjaw)
> Estimated deaths before widespread immunity: 787,000 a year worldwide
> Vaccine introduced: 1924
> Vaccine impact: 96% reduction in mortality since 1988

Diphtheria
> Estimated deaths before widespread immunity: 15,000 Americans in the 1920s
> Vaccine introduced: 1921
> Vaccine impact: Almost 100% decrease in cases

Measles
> Estimated deaths before widespread immunity: 2.6 million a year worldwide
> Vaccine introduced: 1963
> Vaccine impact: 23.2 million lives saved between 2000-2018

Seasonal Influenza (Flu)
> Estimated deaths before widespread immunity: 290,000 to 650,000 a year worldwide
> Vaccine introduced: 1942
> Vaccine impact: Reduces risk of getting sick by up to 60%

Spanish flu
> Estimated deaths before widespread immunity: 50 million
> Vaccine introduced: 1942
> Vaccine impact: Cross-protection from multiple related strains

Polio
> Estimated deaths before widespread immunity: About 50,000 between 1910 and 1960
> Vaccine introduced: 1953
> Vaccine impact: Disease is nearly eradicated worldwide

Ebola
> Estimated deaths before widespread immunity: 11,310 between 2014 and 2016
> Vaccine introduced: 2015
> Vaccine impact: Vaccine is effective 97.5% of the time

Yellow fever
> Estimated deaths before widespread immunity: 5,000 in 1793 in US
> Vaccine introduced: 1935
> Vaccine impact: Lifelong protection for most people

Cholera
> Estimated deaths before widespread immunity: Up to 143,000 worldwide
> Vaccine introduced: 1885
> Vaccine impact: 65%-85% protection for up to 5 years

Hib (Haemophilus influenzae type b)
> Estimated deaths before widespread immunity: 371,000 a year
> Vaccine introduced: 1990s
> Vaccine impact: Lowers the risk of invasive disease
 
Ok, well make sure you check into all the ones that failed before they got it correct. In the case of Polio, there were a bunch. It looks like we might see history repeat itself.
 
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