19.6.2025: C B: Hello Tim. Would you have any good references showing that Polio had basically been eradicated before the introduction of the polio vaccine?This is for Robert, ahead of a discussion with a Fellow of the Royal Society who says “vaccines have saved countless lives”. I read many books about vaccines when I was pregnant with Alex but didn’t organise any references. Many thanks if you can help.
Hi C.B, thanks for this. Will get back to you when I've had a chance to write something. Regards, T. In addition to my reply today (25.6.2025) on FB I suppose the short answer is 'No'. The longer one follows. I hope it is useful. That "vaccines have saved countless lives" is received opinion, never to be challenged because it hasn't been. Covid has rather thrown cold water on that claim and high-lighted a rather more nuanced interpretation of the policy.
WHO: “While it affected children around the world for millennia, the first known clinical description of polio, by British doctor Michael Underwood, was not until 1789, and it was formally recognized as a condition in 1840 by German physician Jakob Heine.
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, frequent epidemics saw polio become the most feared disease in the world. A major outbreak in New York City in 1916 killed over 2000 people, and the worst recorded US outbreak in 1952 killed over 3000.
Many who survived the disease faced lifelong consequences. Deformed limbs meant they needed leg braces, crutches or wheelchairs, and some needed to use breathing devices like the iron lung, an artificial respirator invented for treatment of polio patients.
By the mid-20th century, the poliovirus could be found all over the world and killed or paralysed over half a million people every year. With no cure, and epidemics on the rise, there was an urgent need for a vaccine.”
Personal Background
As a child I was not vaccinated. My father objected to it principally on religious grounds. Whether I was better or worse off as a result is an unknown quantity. I certainly seem to have fared fairly well (touch wood) on the illness front leaving aside stress-related problems at various times.
I remember the polio epidemic in the 1950's. The village in which I grew up was plastered with vivid posters highlighting the dangers. Medical opinion suggested it was infectious and caused by droplet and faeces contamination by an RNA sequence virus wrapped in a protien shell. I think that may have been an over simplification as are many of these popular theories. The cause may be far more inexplicable and enigmatic.
It rather put an end to river swimming for a while but I can't remember it affected my life in any way other than influencing my appreciation of the horrors of the disease - those 'iron lungs', a life-saving innovation for the affected. I don't remember having the polio vaccine administered on the tongue but I might have.
I think my first vaccination was when I was nineteen, when it was a requirement for my public heath studentship. I didn't think to question it and took it in my stride. I think it was the BCG for tuberculosis but I'm not sure. I seem to remember I had one for tetanus which was repeated when I was about twenty-three after I cut my finger in a slaughterhouse, doing statutory meat inspection.
Throughout childhood I was pretty illness-free other than one episode of fever-induced delirium when I suppose I was about eight or nine. The cause was never identified but in hindsight it might have been meningitis-related.
Jumping twenty or thirty years, my sister's children all had significant adverse effects following child immunisation in the nineteen sixties, involving high temperature, spasms and behavioural problems. Subsequently in adulthood they all (No. 4) developed diabetes and have now to treat with insulin. Another brother's two sons also became diabetic. Another brother's son developed Hodgkin's disease, I guess when he was in his early thirties. Whether these endocrinological conditions are related in any way to the vaccination programme is the issue however the immediacy of the physiological reaction and later development of disease, strongly suggests they are. Andrew Wakefield came to a similar conclusion in relation to intestinal inflamation referred to as Crohns' Disease in later life.
The frequency of neural conditions in children - the autistic spectrum - has been much commented upon recently, particularly in the recent Trump election by Robert Kennedy. The huge increase in incidence, now arguably about 1:50 children. Any suggestion this is directly linked to vaccination programmes has been vociferously rejected by the medical/pharmaceutical industry, but it remains the likeliest cause based on 'occam's razor'.
Opinions - even medical ones - may now be shifting, though it takes a long time for an ocean liner to change course. My approach would be to reduce particulaly infant vaccinations to a minimum, and making them subject to risk assessment. Local outbreaks of infectious conditions should be responded to as and when and not just blanket mass provision for everyone.
Current Child Vaccination Regime
https://www.nhs.uk/vaccinations/nhs-vaccinations-and-when-to-have-them/
Currently in Britain, children under the age of one are subject to THREE courses of injations at 8, 12 and 16 weeks, directed at no less than NINE diseases. These are
Diptheria
Hepatitis B
Hib (Haemophilius influenzae type b)
Poliomyelitis
Tetanus
Whooping cough
applied
three times, plus Rotavirus applied Men B accine
applied twice and Pneumococcal applied once; MMR (Mumps and
measels) applied twice.
Then at 3 years and four months : MMR vaccine (2nd dose)
4 in one pre-school booster vaccine .
-
There is no doubt, if contracted, these diseases are significant and serious threats to a child's health. The question is whether the threat outweighs the the dangers from the vaccines themselves? In effect the the child's immune system is primed before the age of one, twenty-nine times for at least ten specific diseases! Whether it is necessary or prudent on a balance of risks, to subject a young child's auto-immune biological responses to this degree is a matter of debate.
In addition, flu vaccine is recommended every year up to the age of 15, plus vaccines for HPV 3 in one teen booster
Men ACWY vaccine
All of these could be causing immunological overload. Even the experimental Covid vaccine was recommended for children despite there being no risk posed by the disease.
Current
day vaccination philosophy and practice
You may however be interested in a few facts and figures. I apologise if they are already familiar to you. I am not 'anti-vax' in the commonly held perjorative sense, although I have been accused of so being, but I am sceptical of the many claims for it made by the medical/pharmaceutical industry. I think the claims for its efficacy are greatly over-stated and its adverse effects largely ignored and supressed as we particularly witness recently in the Covid debacle.
Our approach to health and disease is partly technical/scientific and partly philosophical in the broadest sense. Diseases and the vaccines developed to prevent them are in one sense discrete but in another sense generic. By this I mean signs and symptoms by which diseases are diagnosed can also be seen as different physiological and pathological responses to common causes, be they social, psychological, physical, chemical or radiological. In short life-style, genetic and environmental.
For example obesity results in a whole range of disease conditions, all quite distinct, with different out comes and treatments, but caused by the common feature of being over-weight, a result of excess food intake out of balance with muscle activation or 'exercise'. The same principle applies to many conditions and 'illnesses'.
In similar vein, although there are now a multiplicity of vaccines, for a multiplicity of diseases, they share common features and work through common micro-biological and physiological processes within the body, by stimulating the natural immune system to detect and oppose their presence. This of course is an over-simplification of a highly complex and exquisite chemical process at a cellular level, which in recent years has to a large extent been unravelled and explained. This is not to say there is still an element of mystery attached to it.
Genetic engineering
In recent scientific history, geo-engineering has advanced to such an extent, that humans now have the ability not only to analyse and describe the wequencing of DNA but also to create RNA chains - that is half of the classical DNA helix – replicating known pathogens, which can then be injected into the human body, to obtain a desired immune reaction. This in essence was what the experimental Covid vaccine was, although what appears to be intentional genetic 'implants' seem to have had a multiplicity of adverse effects, replicating the philosophical concept referred to above. This is the context in which I turn to the specific topic of just the one disease of Polio, for which great claims for vaccination are made, without regard to causes or true efficacy or dangers.
The impact of vaccination on TB
Generally then the role of vaccination in preventing many diseases has been much over-stated. Take for example Tuberculosis (TB) a major killer in Britain for centuries and particulary during the Victorian and early Edwardian period, it is clear from the statistics, both the incidence and prognosis were both vastly improved before either sulphonamide drugs or vaccination were introduced in the 1940's. Their introduction may well have assisted in 'mopping up' outbreaks but it is generally accepted that it was other factors, such as improved living standards, housing, working conditions, nuitrition and a general reduction in poverty were the real reasons it declined.
We can draw similar conclusion regarding the enteric diseases such as cholera, typhoid and food poisoning cured not by medicine but by engineering in drainage, water supply and hygiene.
This is illustrated in the graph below, the time-line of which is limited to 1900 but which in fact just continues the trajectory of steep decline pre-dating this. Both World Wars effect an up-tick, larger for the First than the Second, again emphasising rather obvious environmental factors.
It is true that decline continues following the introduction of Solfonamide drugs (1930's to 1950's) and Streptomycina (1950's onwards) and the BCG vaccine from the mid- 1950's, continue the decline but change the trajectory of the graph hardly at all. Immunisation does not become a factor for school children until the mid 1950's until eventually stopped in 2005. Therefore medicine and particulary vaccination, cannot lay claim to the steady and consistent decline in the disease over the preceding century. It is a moot point whether it made any difference at all, or if the decline would not have continued without it, owing to natural attenuation, improved general health and natural resistance.
The shibboleth of the 'Magic Bullet'
The aura of the 'magic bullet' surrounding vaccines and their application in the prevention of disease has been greatly exaggerated and conversely any suggestion that they may be themselves be the cause of chronic or acute illness, energetically opposed and censored. What we witness is the natural decline of the traditional infectious diseases, to be replaced by new ones (such as AIDS) and a whole range of genetic-related conditions including of course cancers of all types.
Whether present day vaccine regimes have a causal relationsip to the disease pattern is open to debate. The Covid experiment certainly proves it can be. We cannot be sure because any attenpt to scientifically investigate causal relationships is blocked even before they start. The treatment of Dr Andrew Wakefield is apocryfal.
The huge increase in children with symptoms of ADHd and other autism spectrum disorders has never been explained. Any suggestion it is related to the vaccination programme is vociferously rejected. Yet something is causing these public health trends.
Those that warned about the adverse consequeces of the novel Covid vaccines were criticised and ostracised almost uniformly, Mike Yeadon notable among them. Doctors were put under unethical pressure to conform and resisted at their professional peril.
Only today in the Times I notice that education, health and care plans for children has surged by more than 10% in the past year alone to a record 638,745 which indicates an increase in demand for specialst support. Specialist support is indicative of increasing numbers of children with physical, mental or educational problems that we might expect them to take into adulthood.
The question is was it caused in whole or part by the injection regime? In seeking to prevent potential childhood diseases, are we creating a whole range of others that reveal themselves in later life? Is there a need to review the whole philosophy and practice of vaccination in general?
Poliomyelitis
So to the topic of Poliomyelitis or 'Polio' for short, to answer your question, we can draw from the vaccination experience generally and from the polio experience in particular. Polio as a disease condition has been around for millienia but it came to prominence in the developed world in the 1950's. What caused this sudden peak is open to speculation.
The table below shows the sudden rise in 1945, which of course happens to coincide with the end of the Second World War a repeat of the phenomenom we noticed for TB above. A feature of the war, apart from all the destruction, stress and upheaval it caused, was the proliferation of toxins into the environment and home. In the case of just one, DDT for de-lousing troops and prisoners of war.
In addition three thermo-nuclear bombs were detonated in 1945 – one in America and two over Japan. Between 1945 and 1960 there were a total of 318 nuclear explosions contaminating the world's atmosphere. land and seasween 215 by the United States, 82 by the Soviet Union, and 21 by the United Kingdom. These undoubtedly had profound health consequences for living thing, including of course humans.
There is little doubt the contamination by radio-active nuclitides were reflected in the incidence of childhood leucaemia. See the following chart which demonstrates a rapid increase post-1945. (Unfortunately I am unable to copy the chart to here)
Sadly, for
some reason, this document refuses to load the the graphs that
demonstrate to salient and relevant points: 1. that the incidence of
childhood leukaemia cases shot up post 1945; and 2, that onset
follows a clear pattern showing a steep five-fold increase age 1 –
4 yrs then decline to age 12. Both of these circumstances fit the
probable causal link with both radio active contamination and
childhood vaccination. It would appear from Google search, the
internet and scientific community much prefers to represent improved
prognosis from advances in treatments rather than the increase of
cancers of all types.
The
graph below also shows trends in pesticide use and the related
decline in rapter populations. Warfare always involves a
proliferation of harmful chemical, biological and radiological
substances. It also of course also involves laqck of food, loss of
housing and emotional stress all of which can have damaging
consequences. Whether these factors played a part in the sudden peak
in the particular disease of polio but the correlation is notable.
Again it is worth noting, incidence is well in decline before
vaccination is introduced or could have had a significant effect.
From: https://wshoms.co.uk/the-history-of-polio/
Here
is the situation in the USA. The replication on different continents
must raise the question of global factors in its cause common to
both. Despite being separated by more than three thousand miles, the
timing and distribution of the graph is replicated almost exactly –
even the final mini-peak. Note how the decline was well under way
before vaccination could have possibly had any noticable effect. The
trajectory just continues. What is to say that the credit given to
the vaccine is in fact quite illusionary and that the rise and fall
is dependent on quite separate factors?
I APOLOGISE FOR THE POOR QUALITY OF THE IMAGE.
The text top down reads:
“1955 first polio vaccine administered in the United States.”
“By 1961 85% of children had been vaccinated against polio.”
“By 1980 wild polio had been eliminated from the USA.”
So
we see that Polio must be viewed within the wider context of
childhood serious illness that post-dates both the introduction of
the immunisation programme and also a dramatic increase in
radiological and chemical contamination of particularly the
atmospheric environment.
Note how the cases do not clearly correlate with the application of the vaccine. The rise and fall might equally be put down to other more generic factors or to natural fluctuation. Not until 1962 does it fall below the historic 1912 – 1945 average. Vaccination is indroduced when incidence is already in decline and does not appear to have a marked effect on cases even theoretically, except towards the end of a sixteen year period.
The role of pesticides generally in the health profile of the nation cannot be under-estimated nor its adverse effect on the environment. The following graph illustrates the pervasive and ubiquitous use of these chemicals to which we must add many more such as lead in petrol and radiological fall-out from nuclear testing and accidents from the 1960's onwards. The human metabolism has to cope with these novel contaminants and some are more subjected to them than others. A multiplicity of drugs both medicinal and recreational have to be added to the mix.
Types of Polio Vaccine
There were basically two types of vaccine administered: inactivated polio virus vaccine (IPV) by injection and oral polio virus vaccine (OPV) by mouth.
IPV is carried out routinely at 8, 12 and 16 weeks with pre-school boosters at 5 and 13 years. There is virtually no information on any possible adverse effects.
OPV is a live weakened polio virus. It was widely administered but now less so, partly as a result of incidents where it actually resulted in the disease it was intended to provide immunity from! Details of these medical disasters are provided below.
The WHO estimates 'Vaccine Associated Paralytic Poliomyelitis' (VAPP) at a global level for every birth cohort of 1 million children in OPV-only using countries, there are 2-4 cases of VAPP. This translates to an estimated 250 – 500 VAPP cases globally per year. Of these, about 40% are caused by OPV’s type 2 component. In the Region of the Americas, the VAPP risk is 1 case per 7.68 million doses administered.
I quote “Although wild poliovirus type 2 appears to have been eradicated globally in 1999, vaccine-related type 2 viruses continue to cause the majority of cVDPV outbreaks and many VAPP cases. Therefore, OPV type 2 now carries more risk than benefit and undermines global polio eradication efforts. Thus, tOPV will be replaced with bivalent OPV (bOPV), which will continue to target the remaining polio types 1 and 3. Once these types are eradicated, bOPV will also be withdrawn.”
“When a child receives OPV, the vaccine virus enters the child’s mouth and gut and replicates. The child then mounts immune responses in three places: (1) antibody response in the blood that protects against the virus invading the nervous system and causing paralysis, (2) immune response in the mouth which prevents shedding of virus in oral secretions and spread from those secretions and (3) intestinal immunity (also called gut or mucosal immunity), which prevents shedding of the virus in the stool.
“Thus, children vaccinated with OPV who come into contact with wild poliovirus are less likely to excrete poliovirus in their oral fluids or stool than unvaccinated persons. The predominant mode of transmission in the developing world is thought to be fecal-oral. Virus is shed in the feces and, in poor sanitary conditions and with suboptimal hygiene measures, can infect other persons if transmitted by dirty hands or contaminated food and water.
“Therefore, strong intestinal immunity prevents transmission. IPV is an inactivated vaccine (killed virus) that stimulates a very good humoral response (antibodies in the blood) in children after only 1 or 2 doses. IPV also prevents children from excreting virus in their mouths as effectively as OPV and hence to the extent that polioviruses are transmitted through oral secretions, IPV is very effective at blocking that type of transmission.
“However, IPV alone does not induce the same level of intestinal immunity as OPV. Thus, while individuals vaccinated with IPV alone are protected against paralysis, they may excrete the virus and allow it to spread. The combination of IPV with bOPV provides the advantages of both vaccines: strong intestinal immunity and antibody protection against the two serotypes in bOPV, types 1 and 3. This combination gives both the child and the child’s community the best protection.
Source: https://www.paho.org/sites/default/files/IPV-IntroductionFAQ-e.pdf
Polio Vaccination Disasters
CUTTER INCIDENT USA
Following from: https://www.science.org/content/article/unqualified-failure-polio-vaccine-policy-left-thousands-kids-paralyzed
“Something momentous happened in the history of polio eradication in April 2016: Over a period of 2 weeks, 155 countries and territories started to use a new version of Albert Sabin’s classic oral polio vaccine (OPV) that no longer protected against one of the three types of poliovirus. Type 2 virus had been eradicated by then, and the only remaining type 2 polio cases were touched off by the live virus in the vaccine itself. Dropping the type 2 component from the vaccine would end those cases as well, the thinking went.
But “the switch,” as this global move has become known, became “an unqualified failure,” according to an unusually blunt draft report commissioned by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) that is now open for public comments.
Unexpectedly, vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 has continued to circulate after the switch, paralyzing more than 3300 children. And GPEI has spent more than $1.8 billion trying to quash these outbreaks, mostly in Africa.
Those numbers are certain to increase until the polio program finds a way to deal with the problem it inadvertently—and with the best of intentions—created.
Cutter Incident: 1955
“In 1955, some batches of polio vaccine given to the public contained live polio virus, even though they had passed required safety testing. Over 250 cases of polio were attributed to vaccines produced by one company: Cutter Laboratories. This case, which came to be known as the Cutter Incident, resulted in many cases of paralysis. The vaccine was recalled as soon as cases of polio were detected.
The Cutter Incident was a defining moment in the history of vaccine manufacturing and government oversight of vaccines, and led to the creation of a better system of regulating vaccines. After the government improved this process and increased oversight, polio vaccinations resumed in the fall of 1955.
Simian Virus 40 (SV40): 1955 - 1963
“From 1955 to 1963, an estimated 10-30% of polio vaccines administered in the US were contaminated with simian virus 40 (SV40). The virus came from monkey kidney cell cultures used to make polio vaccines at that time. Most of the contamination was in the inactivated polio vaccine (IPV), but it was also found in oral polio vaccine (OPV). After the contamination was discovered, the U.S. government established testing requirements to verify that all new lots of polio vaccines were free of SV40.
Because of research done with SV40 in animal models, there has been some concern that the virus could cause cancer in humans. However, most studies looking at the relationship between SV40 and cancers are reassuring, finding no causal association between receipt of SV40-contaminated polio vaccine and development of cancer.” Source: https://www.cdc.gov/vaccine-safety/historical-concerns/index.html
Following from: https://www.science.org/content/article/unqualified-failure-polio-vaccine-policy-left-thousands-kids-paralyzed
"Something momentous happened in the history of polio eradication in April 2016: Over a period of 2 weeks, 155 countries and territories started to use a new version of Albert Sabin’s classic oral polio vaccine (OPV) that no longer protected against one of the three types of poliovirus. Type 2 virus had been eradicated by then, and the only remaining type 2 polio cases were touched off by the live virus in the vaccine itself. Dropping the type 2 component from the vaccine would end those cases as well, the thinking went.
"But “the switch,” as this global move has become known, became “an unqualified failure,” according to an unusually blunt draft report commissioned by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) that is now open for public comments. Unexpectedly, vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 has continued to circulate after the switch, paralyzing more than 3300 children. And GPEI has spent more than $1.8 billion trying to quash these outbreaks, mostly in Africa. Those numbers are certain to increase until the polio program finds a way to deal with the problem it inadvertently—and with the best of intentions—created.
“It is about time someone publicly declared the switch a failure, given the obvious management and leadership errors,” says Kimberly Thompson, who heads Kid Risk, Inc., a nonprofit that has long modeled the consequences of various polio vaccine options."
Following from: https://digitalcommons.law.ggu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1205&context=annlsurvey
The Gates Foundation focuses on world health and population and highlights its strategy of accelerating scientific discovery with reducing costs. Since the early 2000s, the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunizations (Gavi),
Global Health Innovative Technology Fund and PATH, all heavily funded by the Gates Foundation, have been distributing vaccines and drugs to vulnerable populations in Africa and India.
In 2010, the Gates Foundation funded experimental malaria and meningitis vaccine trials across Africa and HPV vaccine programs in India. All of these programs resulted in numerous deaths and injuries, with accounts of forced vaccinations and uninformed consent.
Ultimately, these health campaigns, under the guise of saving lives, have relocated large scale clinical trials of untested or unapproved drugs to developing markets where administering drugs is less regulated and cheaper.
Conclusion
You asked if I had any information to support the view that Polio had been virtually eliminated prior to the introduction of the the first vaccine. I answered no but it prompted a discussion of polio vaccination and vaccination in the light of disease more generally. I apologise for that but I hope you find something interesting, if not relevant there.
What we can say however is that the outbreak that appears to have been common to both the UK and USA between 1945 and 1960 (I'm sorry I haven't been able to check if the pattern was repeated generally throught the world or what the pattern might suggest) was effectively in major decline prior to the introduction of any vaccines. Further that at least in one notable incident in 1955 and subsequently (how many more cases were not attributed to the vaccine?) immunisation actually caused significant numbers of cases of the disease!
The indication is that the trajectory of the decline was fixed and only marginally affected, if at all, by vaccines, although of course the claim by proponents of it is otherwise. What I have suggested is the causes of the outbreak and of its decline are to be found elsewhere in province of war, DDT use and radiological contamination.
With the decline in polio, there was also a startling rise in cases of childhood leukaemia (and cancers generally) which is almost certainly linked with the programme of atmospheric tests as the scientific research from Hiroshima and Nagasaki confirms. This tends to strengthen my former suggestion in relation to polio.
Besides the disastrous consequences of some OPV programmes, the less obvious adverse consequences of vaccination have been under-studied because of medical establishment and pharmaceutical resistance. As a result the efficacy and desireability of the injection schedule has largely gone unchallenged. Has there ever actually been any research into the relative health status of unvaccinated children?
In the last thirty years or so, increasing attention has been paid to the neurological consequences of vaccines as these have now assumed almost epidemic proportions in young people and adults. A quarter of British adults now claim a neurological or psychological condition requiring medical intervention. And of course the Covid vaccine has been proved to have been the cause of a whole range of adverse conditions and arguably the most likely cause of a spike in the death rate.
Nor has the part played, if any, in the general state of the nation's health, which by muliple indices cannot be said to be good. Given the role of the immunological ssystem, is it possible that vaccines have played a part in the emmergence of later diseases that now plague the nation?
All of this points to the need for a fundamental reappraisal of vaccination policy and advice. There should be a push to reducing the number of vaccines given to the child and far more emphasis placed on risk assessment as the criterion for intervention.
Recent papers:
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/153506/injected-vaccine-could-help-eradicate-polio/
The study, by Imperial College London and the Christian Medical College in Vellore, India, suggests that the injected polio vaccine (IPV), which is rarely used today in countries affected by polio, could provide better and longer lasting protection against infection if used in combination with the more commonly used live oral polio vaccine (OPV).
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25018120/
Inactivated poliovirus vaccine (IPV) does not induce an intestinal mucosal immune response, but could boost protection in children who are mucosally primed through previous exposure to OPV.
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/imperial-college/medicine/sph/ide/2013-14.pdf
In 1954 Jonas Salk was lauded for developing a polio vaccine, making the cover of Time magazine. He had successfully inactivated each of the 3 virus strains found in nature using formalin, and injected the resulting inactivated poliovirus vaccine (IPV) into monkeys and later, his family, to show this caused antibodies to the virus to be raised in the blood. In 1955 a field trial in over 1.3 million American children showed the vaccine to be safe and highly effective in preventing paralytic poliomyelitis. By 1960 IPV had reduced polio incidence in the USA by over 95% to about 1,300 reported cases, a tremendous public health success. Yet, by 1968 the USA no longer used IPV.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/rmv.401
Once wild poliovirus transmission has been interrupted by OPV, the only poliomyelitis due to poliovirus will be caused by OPV. Risks are posed by the very tool responsible for successful interruption of wild poliovirus transmission.
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.2217/fmb.15.19
IPV v. OPV?
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4212416/
Poliomyelitis: Historical Facts, Epidemiology, and Current Challenges in Eradication
In the United States, polio incidence fell from 13.9 cases per 100 000 in 1954 to <0.5 cases per 100 000 in 1965, endemic transmission ceased by 1970, and the last case of domestically acquired poliomyelitis was reported in 1979.
https://academic.oup.com/jid/article/224/Supplement_4/S398/6378088
The immune response to IPV depends on the number of doses, the interval between doses, and the presence of maternally derived antibody, which impairs immune responses in infants up to 6 months of age [5–7].
ADVERSE EFFECTS OF POLIO VACCINE
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4083159/#:~:text=Headache%20(22.4%25)%2C%20abdominal%20pain,and%20nervous%20system%20(29.3%25).
Adverse events following immunization with oral poliovirus in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo. Headache (22.4%), abdominal pain (17.2%), fever (11.7%), diarrhea (9.9%), and asthenia (7.5%) were the common symptoms. Paralysis and asthma-like reactions were rare and serious adverse events in this study. The most affected systems were gastro-intestinal (33.5%) and nervous system (29.3%).
Adverse Events Associated with Childhood Vaccines: Evidence Bearing on Causality. It is not clear whether either OPV or IPV confers lifelong immunity (Nishio et al., 1984). The concept that live attenuated polio vaccine causes a small number of poliomyelitis cases thus has a history of at least six decades. Since the 1960s there have been about 100 studies reporting individual cases, case series, and national surveillances of vaccine-associated cases of paralytic poliomyelitis. The evidence establishes a causal relation between OPV and paralytic and nonparalytic polio. The incidence of paralytic polio in OPV recipients has been well documented and is greater with the first dose of vaccine. The CDC has estimated that the overall dose-related incidence of paralytic disease is 1 case per 520,000 first doses.
POSTSCRIPT
Hi C, The academic debate seems to centre around whether IPV or OPV is best method. Some work has been done on adverse effects. The concensus seems to be one paralytic case from the OPV per 500.000 application, and a higher rate for first as compared to subsequent ones. Typically the less severe the reaction the more likely it shows. The contrast with covid - around 1:800 - is stark. Hygiene first and foremost, i.e. the prevention of faecal contamination of food and water, must be the primary line of defence. However I find the replication of the graphs and their timing vis a vis other factors fascinating. The question remains whether it is the vaccine or other public health knowledge and advances that are truly responsible for the decline in cases? I'm sure you are better versed in the scientific literature on the subject, but I attach a short list I checked out below. Regards, Tim.
