During epidemics, as many as 7,000 children a week were infected by the polio virus.
During a polio epidemic, I, along with many other children, was not allowed to play outside. Can you imagine the difficulty entertaining a child inside while the summer weather was nice?
One day, Doc Eddy came to our home to respond to my mother’s worry about her 4-year-old son’s illness. A polio epidemic was raging across the country, and overwhelmed hospitals set up makeshift facilities to handle the influx.
My mother cried quietly in a corner of the bedroom when the doctor said I had polio.
Eventually I was released from the hospital and returned home. With time, I wondered why my little friend didn’t come over to play in my sandbox as he had before. It was years later that I was told he had died from tetanus while I was in the hospital.
But my polio story does not end there.
Twenty-five years ago I was diagnosed with post-polio. Post-polio causes the original paralysis of the infection to return. Though I had recovered from the original polio and could walk and enjoy a normal life, I am now in a wheelchair.
William Grant of Fort Wayne is a retired researcher in virology and immunology. He also managed vaccine production for a pharmaceutical manufacturer and managed a public health agency.
The lifesaving "iron lung" was first used on a polio patient on October 12, 1928. This 1942 newspaper diagram explains how one worked.
An iron lung essentially "breathed" for people with polio whose chest muscles had become paralyzed. It enclosed almost all of the patient's body and acted as a respirator, using air pressure to expand and contract their diaphragm.
Paul Alexander: A 70-Year Journey Inside an Iron Lung, Defying All Odds
In 1952, six-year-old Paul Alexander from Dallas faced a life-altering blow when polio struck during one of the U.S.'s deadliest outbreaks. Paralyzed from the neck down within days, he was confined to an iron lung—a hulking metal device that breathed for him when his lungs failed. Doctors gave him little hope, but Paul defied them all.
With sheer willpower, he mastered "frog breathing"—a technique using his throat to gulp air—allowing brief escapes from the machine. Those precious minutes outside fueled a remarkable life. He became Dallas’s first student to graduate high school remotely, earned degrees from the University of Texas, and practiced law from home, earning respect as a fierce advocate, not just a patient.
In 2020, he shared his saga in his memoir Three Minutes for a Dog: My Life in an Iron Lung, chronicling his fight for education, independence, and dignity. Paul spent over 70 years in the iron lung—calling it both his "cage" and "cocoon"—making him one of the last to rely on the device.
He passed away on March 11, 2024, at 78, leaving a legacy as a lawyer, writer, survivor, and inspiration. His story spans two worlds: polio’s dark era and the vaccine triumph that nearly wiped it out, a testament to human resilience and science’s power.
Awaiting the Polio Vaccine (4/22/21) posted April 26, 2021 by Indiana Historical Society on YouTube In 1955, the United States waited with bated breath as the FDA contemplated approval of Jonas Salk’s polio vaccine. The polio epidemic, a viral disease that causes paralysis usually within children, caused wide spread panic in the 1940s and 50s. Explore how Hoosiers played an important role in the production and distribution with Lilly Company Archivist Michelle Jarrell.
Images shows On February 23, 1954 Dr. Jonas Salk gave the first polio vaccine during field trials to children in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The vaccine was produced by Eli Lily and Company in Indianapolis.
[ link in image doesn't work - similar article - A Tale of Two Viruses Daly Walker was struck by polio when he was a boy. Today, he compares America’s response to polio in the 1950s with COVID-19 today. ]
"Historical accounts of mid-twentieth century American medicine primarily focused on its successes, including the development of new interventions, such as penicillin to combat bacterial infections or chemotherapy to target cancer. More recently, historians have examined the politics of medicine, revealing challenges, setbacks, and ethical dilemmas. The case of the first polio vaccine, developed by University of Pittsburgh researcher, Dr. Jonas Salk, is particularly instructive, as it shows that public reception of new interventions was not always positive."
Polio nearly gone, but fight remainsThe world witnessed only 223 polio cases last year, the lowest level in history and an impressive advance from the hundreds of thousands of children afflicted annually as recently as the 1980s. However, the eradication quest is not over, and the next steps look difficult. Read the rest of the Washington Post editorial April 11, 2013.
Iron lungs were a necessity during the peak of the polio plague in the 20th century. A Texas man continues to use one today after he became paralyzed from the disease.
The world is so close to eradicating polio – but increasing vaccination coverage is urgently needed to meet this goal before the end of 2023. Learn more in a report from CDC and WHO: https://bit.ly/mm7219a3
Did you know? Vaccination has eliminated polio in the United States, but polio still remains a threat in other parts of the world . A polio threat anywhere is a polio threat everywhere – putting children who are not immune at risk of paralysis or even death.
Global partners set a goal to eradicate polio in 1988. Since then, cases are down by more than 99%, but challenges remain in the last mile of polio eradication.
. A polio threat anywhere is a polio threat everywhere – putting children who are not immune at risk of paralysis or even death.