Just watched a PBS program on the history of polio in this country. Thing is, I remember many of the events shown.

Polio was a relatively rare disease, and paralysis even more so. But people were terrified of it.

I remember very well theaters and swimming pools being closed. School, however, marched right on ahead.

Salk developed a dead virus vaccine in the early 50s. This was a new concept. His rival, Sabin insisted that a dead virus vaccine wasn't a real vaccine, and that it was dangerous. Through the early 50s, Salk ran monkey trials, and was sure that his vaccine worked. He even took the vaccine himself, and gave it to his family. In 1955, Salk ran a huge human trial, vaccinating hundreds of thousands of school children.

Then a large number of children who had been vaccinated developed polio. The US Surgeon General paused the program. Turned out that the problem was a bad batch of vaccine out of Cutter Labs. After an 8 day pause, the program rolled forward again.

A few years later, Sabin's vaccine hit the market. I remember receiving that on a sugar cube in 1961.

There were a lot of parallels to our recent experience with Covid. I'm not sure we learned a lot from them.

I remember taking the sugar cube! 1962 for me

I remember getting the sugar cube. My old friend Jack’s wife died from polio.

As a kid I received both the shot and sugar cube.

I took a hit of acid on a sugar cube

and some beavis and butthead blotter too oh and some Dexter’s Laboratory too. Haha. 6 hits went thru the wash machine. Sonovabitch!!

I think I remember the sugar cube too.... Damn I'm way beyond "middle age". I clung to I'm in my "late youth" until I passed 55.

The big difference is that covid ushered in nucleic acid vaccines into the mainstream. That is a BIG difference.

I remember it as a liquid? Might have been a different vaccine.

covid has a 99.4 per cent survival and higher for children

polio has what effect on children?


did they US shut down the entire economy for 18 months during polio?

the Covid vax doesn't work but the polio does


it is hilarious to see boomers, who lived through polio epidemic ,now freak out and hide in their homes 2 years during the benign covid cold virus

I see no parallels between the two

My dad had polio when he was a kid, never quite walked right. The iron lung was another scary apparatus of the time.

What really brought Rona full circle to me, was the stories my grandmother (born in 1903) used to tell me about the Spanish Flu when I was a kid in the early 70’s. People dying alone, no room in hospitals, Except she didn’t say anyone panicked or it became a big political football.

My mom’s dad was born in 1890. He was a smallpox survivor. One of the epidemics that came thru around WWI in Texas ( maybe 1914?). He was 4F’d by the draft board in either Williamson or Milam county in 1917 as a result.

In '54 the vaccine Salk vaccine came out, but a bad batch made in California at Cutter Lab., caused polio. It caused polio in lots of children and even some deaths. They determined it was the lab, not the vaccine and in '55 they started giving the vaccines as shots. It proved to be successful in preventing polio. A man named Sabin made a modification to the Salk vaccine and that was given on the sugar cube.

These are vaccines..... they prevent the disease. The covid jab does next to nothing!

and lived through it all.

Do recall one kid that survived and had a leg brace. Also seems the disease can affect one in later life with all kinds of balance and muscular issues.

There were far more people who got polio from the vaccine than from some other means. It was about 3:1.

Trust your government. Or else. Or else, even if you do.

Bull Schit! Look at the numbers and how they dropped when the vaccine came out.

I copied and pasted this for you to read.....

Polio was once one of the most feared diseases in the U.S. In the early 1950s, before polio vaccines were available, polio outbreaks caused more than 15,000 cases of paralysis each year. Following introduction of vaccines—specifically, trivalent inactivated poliovirus vaccine (IPV) in 1955 and trivalent oral poliovirus vaccine (OPV) in 1963—the number of polio cases fell rapidly to less than 100 in the 1960s and fewer than 10 in the 1970s.

I wish the boomers DID freak out and hide in their homes, but no, we all had to mask up and use hand sanitizer 50 times a day otherwise they would get sick and it would be everyone else's fault. They wouldn't dare buy your Chinese wares if you didn't act like a leper around them....

Gen X and Millennials are the Ken and Karens that freaked out, where I live.

I got both polio vaccines.

How many of us still have a smallpox vaccination scar?

Present!

In the 1950s polio was a fearsome issue in many communities, and I remember the precautions, the warnings, the closed venues and many parents who seemed to feel helpless in trying to protect their kids.

Three of my friends suffered the disease. One wound up with badly deformed and poorly functioning legs - fought through like a warrior and later became an expert in electrical transmission, an excellent guitarist, and did almost everything the rest of us did as adults (including riding his big FLH Harley). He married a great gal and they raised four sons. In his 60s, the notorious late in life effects roared in and he suffered a great deal before succumbing.

The second went onto an iron lung in order to sustain breathing and we neighborhood kids were allowed to go visit her two at a time. She recovered without any noticeable deformities as a teenager but I never again saw her after that.

The third kid had almost no ill effects - just greatly scared for a while.

The arrival of the vaccines was a BIG deal, especially the second one.

Yes, I was twice treated as well....

I had the shot and sugar cub as well back in the early 60's

Got a friend that is not a lot older than me that has Polio, don't know if he got the shot and sugar back then or not

My Great Uncle had polio as a child in the 1930's ,it twisted him like a corkscrew,into a hunchback.He recovered but was crippled for life.He became an accountant,had a modified Rambler he drove,but walked with a severe limp as one leg was shorter than the other.Late in life he had trouble breathing from it and passed away in his house in 1983.My stepfather also had it,his torso grew but his legs never did.My father in law also had polio,it discharged him from the Army.It was a bad,scary disease.

Ditto.

The vaccines were a miracle, until God was kicked out of medicine and the folks turned to satan as their leader.

Millions of families lived in fear of the big P back then.

I had polio at 18 months in the 1952. I have muscles in my legs that didn't develop properly. One leg is about 1/4 in. short and I don't run for grunt. 4F in Viet era. I get along pretty well. Most folks can't tell I have poor muscle development and only develop a limp in my gait when I am very tired. So far no residual reoccurance, bless the Lord for that.

I had polio in 1951. Left me with legs shorter than normal and one an inch shorter than the other. I remember noting for a while kids being gone from school. Several out of np my class. Some died. I was lucky, I guess. Limited flexibility and some compromising of joints. Wish they'd had the vaccine when I was six. 78 now and still moving.

I'm 80 and I got the Polio vax in upstate NY. Where did you live ?

I got the sugar cube, the nurse put a few drops of pink liquid on it. This was a big deal to my mom. The vaccine worked.

My dad got it in the 50's. I was 3 or 4 at the time. He made a full recovery but was in the hospital and rehab for 4 months. While there, he saw some scary things.
When the Salk hit the streets, Dad had us 1st in line for the shots. When Sabine came out, he had us at the front of the line again.

I remember the sugar cube...but what I REALLY remember was that smallpox inoculation...man 30-40 kinder gardeners all crying. LOL what a day.

Lots of cases among the ‘Fire members from back in the days. I had the sugar cube as a kid in England.

When I was in Africa in the ‘80’s polio was still very much a thing, seems like every village had a couple of kids on crutches already with a withered leg. Sad and completely preventable.

I wasn't around, but I'm betting they didn't tell un vaxed people they shouldn't have Thanksgiving because they might kill Grandma.

I lived thru it. But there is some wrong information. If you were exposed to someone who developed polio or was diagnosed with it, you were quarantined for X number of days. I can't remember the amount of time, but me and the whole family of 6 were quarantined when my cousin was diagnosed with it and we had visited with them the day before. Yes, some things were shut down because they had no idea what or how polio was or transmitted.The medical field instituted the quarantine, not the government and there was no enforcement.

We saw the same thing as today there were a large group of idiots that didn't believe there was problem .

Polio does and can cause problems with seniors who where exposed to it, but had even mild cases.

Same here and IIRC it was three doses on the sugar cubes.

A friend of mine had it and I remember him having steel braces on his lower legs.

You guys are talking about a time when vaccines were actually just that. Before the book definition was changed to fit with the poison they are dealing out to moronic sheeple

I had polio when I was 4 yrs old. This was shortly after the Cutter disaster and everyone was still afraid of the vaccine The docs told my parents that the vaccine might help, but they wasn't sure. Would they be willing to use me as a guinea pig to see if it would do any good to give the shot, after you had polio, but still in the early stages. I got the shot. I remember well the hospital and rehab. I came out ok, but with weak legs and they cramped a lot. Being young and otherwise healthy, over the years, my legs gained strength and by the time I was 8 or10, all was fine. Now that I'm older, I dont know if the aches and pains are from the polio or just old age.

How about running the gauntlet in boot camp with medics on both sides with those hydraulic injectors? Three or four hits to each arm, and big, tough-looking football player types passing out before they made the whole trip!

I've been vaccinated 3 times and still dont have a scar. I dont remember when I got the first vaccination, but I didn't scar. Although my school records showed I had been vaccinated, several years later the nurse at a different school didn't see a scar and figured the records were wrong, so I was vaccinated again. Another couple years later, at another new school, the nurse said my records were wrong. I told her I had the vaccination, but she argued and gave it to me again. After the scab came off, I went back to the nurse and showed her that I didn't scar from it.