Once one of the most feared diseases in history, polio paralyzed thousands and reshaped modern medicine. In this episode, we trace its story—from ancient Egypt to the devastating 1916 New York outbreak—and explore how it sparked the invention of the iron lung, the rise of intensive care, and a worldwide vaccine revolution. Meet the scientists who turned panic into prevention—Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin—and learn why staying up to date on vaccines still protects us today. 💉 Myth busted: Vaccines aren’t “new” or “untested”—they’re continually refined to be safer and more effective than ever.
1) https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/history-disease-outbreaks-vaccine-timeline/polio
2) https://medicine.yale.edu/news/yale-medicine-magazine/article/breaking-the-back-of-polio/
3) Neurohospitalist 2014 Oct;4(4):223–229. doi: 10.1177/1941874414533352 polio history and epidemology, Clinical manifestations of polio
3) https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(23)00781-8/abstract. Switch to OPV 2 strain vaccine
4) https://ourworldindata.org/polio
5) https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(20)32552-2/pdf Vaccine refusal rate in Pakistan
7)https://www.verywellhealth.com/important-facts-about-polio-4588579
8) Small Steps –The Year I Got Polio by Peg Kehret