10 January 2008
The 1930s polio epidemic
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It's about forty years now since the introduction of a powerful vaccine more or less eradicated poliomyelitis from Australia, and the memory of this terrifying disease has faded in the general population. But there are thousands of Australians still living with its legacy, and we hear from two of them today.
Polio is an airborne virus which enters the body through the mouth and attacks the motor cells of the body, resulting in paralysis of the muscles. There's no one pattern to polio; its victims may be affected in the muscles of the arms, legs, hands or chest. A very small number of people will die when severely affected in the lungs or the brain stem.
An ancient disease, polio reared its head in Australia around the turn of the century. For the following fifty years or so, every second or third summer was submerged in a wave of fear, resulting in thousands of people -- usually small children -- infected, hospitalised and, in the nightmare cases, crippled.
Ironically, medical historians think that it may have been the high standards of public health which made Australia so vulnerable, leaving the community deprived of the built-up immunities found in less developed countries.
Presenter
Jane Connors
Producer
Jane Connors
