Could you imagine being stricken by a deadly virus, that if you survived, you would not be able to walk without any assistance? In 1938, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s personal struggle with infantile paralysis led him to create the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis (NFIP) which would help find a treatment for infantile paralysis, which is better known as polio. This virus was usually contracted during childhood, and attacked the central nervous system, which if the victim did survive, he or she would then usually suffer from debilitating paralysis well into their lives. Major polio epidemics had been very prevalent in many parts of the United States since the late nineteenth century, but the poliomyelitis virus has since been mostly eradicated in the United States. Although, polio has been mostly eradicated in the United States, this virus is still very prevalent in developing countries throughout the world. This foundation has since been given the name March of Dimes, which was coined early in the foundation’s history. Although, March of Dimes now focuses on the prevention of premature births, birth defects, and infant mortality, when it first was created, its original mission was to raise funds for a poliomyelitis vaccine and, once the vaccine was created, to prevent the negative effects of the vaccine.
In the early stages of the NFIP, the foundation had to focus on the raising of funds to fund research for a poliomyelitis vaccine. To help raise the funds for the vaccine, the foundation centered its campaign around President Roosevelt’s birthday, because after all the President was the creator of the foundation and funding the research needed to find the eventual cure of poliomyelitis was very clos...
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At first polio was a troubling prospect when it first reared its ugly head in the United States of America. In a noble effort to be rid of polio, America as a whole was to adopt stringent sanitation measures. Everywhere, especially the home was to be spotless and clean in order to try and prevent the contraction of polio. This coupled with the view that America as a western nation seemed impervious to such a lowly disease tried to assuage American fear of the disease. Despite the measures commonly adopted throughout the myriad of cities and towns, polio still managed to spread around the country and wreak havoc taking thousands of lives. An outbreak that ravaged America claimed nearly 27,000 lives in a terrible reckoning before it finally subsided. This and several other troubling outbreaks
Polio: An American Story describes a struggle to find a vaccine on polio through several researchers’ lives, and over the course of many years. The second thesis is the struggle between Salk and Sabin, two bitter rivals who had their own vaccine that they believed would cure polio. The author David M. Oshinsky, is describing how difficult it was to find the cure to a horrifying disease, which lasted from the Great Depression until the 1960’s. Oshinsky then writes about how foundations formed as fundraisers, to support polio research. Lastly, the author demonstrates how researchers were forced to back track on multiple occasions, to learn more about polio.
The authors used a historical timeline to introduce a need. Stressing the number of lives lost allows the authors show the importance of vaccines. The repeated emphasis on those lives being the lives of children played on the emotions of readers. Once the need is established Lee and Carson-Dewitt clarify the use of “a dead or mild form of a virus” to create a vaccine (Lee, Carson-Dewitt, 2016, p.2). The distinction of the types of
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Through the rise of technological advances in medicine, the vaccine has changed the world for the greater good of the human race. Making a great triumph and virtually eliminating an array of life-threatening diseases, from smallpox to diphtheria, thus adding approximately thirty years to many humans’ life spans. Although, a new complication has arisen, possibly linking neurological digression with this rise of new vaccines. Such a digression has forced parents to exempt their children from receiving vaccinations and brought forth mental anguish affecting the minds of many.
...reintroduces an eradicated, contagious virus into a society where the majority of people are not immune to it. It could lead to deaths of some of the most-integral members of society while preventing a projected #% of these people from going to work, for multiple days due to illness. Additionally, those healthcare professionals who directly treat the immunocompromised on a daily basis could potentially spread illness to those whom they care for, as well as to other people whom they interact with most often such as their family-members (7). The risk of illness is not shared equally by all U.S. citizens, just by those vaccinated. The immunocompromised may be put at high risk for disease for the sake of the American public. The authenticity...”achieving a goal in a manner consistent with what is valued about the performance and seen as essential (or true) to its nature”
While vaccines will help each individual, it will also contribute to the future health of the generations to come. In the US, vaccines have reduced or eliminated many infectious diseases that once routinely killed or harmed many infants, children, and adults. That effect is greatly caused by the fact that more and more people are choosing to get vaccinated. Vaccines have eradicated Polio and smallpox along with other diseases. The last case of smallpox in the United States was in 1948; the last case in the world was 1977 in Somalia. Due to these eradicated diseases, there is no need to vaccinate against them. However, keeping up with the latest vaccinations, decreases the risks of those diseases to ever reappear. The CDC notes that many vaccine-preventable diseases are still in the United States or "only a plane ride away." Although the paralytic form of polio has largely disappeared thanks to vaccination, the virus still exists in countries like Pakistan(“ProCon.org".) Those who choose not to vaccinate are not only risking their lives but the lives of their young children and the elderly. There are some people who are not able to get vaccinated, due to specific medical conditions or age. These people rely heavily on “herd immunity”. Herd immunity means that when a "critical portion" of a population is vaccinated against a contagious disease, it
mostly children, and in the first half of the 20th century the epidemics of polio
In Unites States, poliomyelitis is not endemic therefore even one case can become an epidemic. Geographically more than 125 countries remained polio-endemic in 1988. Overall global incidents have decreased by 99% since 1988. Between 2009 and 2010 twenty three poliomyelitis free countries were re-infected due to imported virus. The countries of Afghanistan, India, Nigeria and Paki...
For innumerable centuries, unrelenting strains of disease have ravaged society. From the polio epidemic in the twentieth century to the measles cases in the latter half of the century, such an adverse component of nature has taken the lives of many. In 1796, Edward Jenner discovered that exposure to cowpox could foster immunity against smallpox; through injecting the cowpox into another person’s arm, he founded the revolutionary concept known as a vaccination. While many attribute the eradication of various diseases to vaccines, many United States citizens are progressively beginning to oppose them. Many deludedly thought that Measles had been completely terminated throughout the United States; however, many children have been patronized by