In 1977, Dr Jonas Salk who developed the first polio vaccine, testified along with other scientists, that mass inoculation against polio was the cause of most polio cases throughout the USA since 1961. (Science 4/4/77 “Abstracts”)[1]
I feel so ashamed.
I was conned by those evil vaccine pushers.
I didn’t know that Dr. Jonas Salk was an Anti-Vaccinationist.
Just kidding. Dr. Salk spent the rest of his life trying to improve the use of vaccines. In 1961 the Sabin vaccine was approved in the US. It contained a live virus. Dr. Salk and Dr. Sabin had a bit of a rivalry over which vaccine was better. The Sabin oral live virus, with the possibility of causing polio, or the Salk injected killed virus, with the requirement for periodic booster shots. In the quote, 1961 refers to the approval of the Sabin vaccine. In the first chart, the introduction of both vaccines is marked.
Dr. Salk had already been using the killed vaccine for years and was opposed to the introduction of a less safe vaccine. If there were no killed vaccine available, I doubt he would have recommended against using the Sabin vaccine. If the live vaccine were the only alternative to the illness, the only sensible choice is the live vaccine. Dr. Salk was a sensible man.
No cases of wild-type poliovirus infection have been reported in the United States since 1979. Until 1998, an average of 8-10 cases associated with the vaccine virus were reported every year. Since the institution of an all-inactivated poliovirus vaccine (IPV) policy in the routine immunization schedule, the number of vaccine-associated cases has significantly decreased. Four cases of vaccine-derived poliovirus were identified in 2005 among unvaccinated children in an Amish community in Minnesota.[2]
So, the only people at risk for polio in the US are those who are not vaccinated. This has been the case for about 3 decades.
Here is a chart that shows what happened to the rate of infection in the US from 1951 to 1993. The first arrow indicates when the Salk vaccine was licensed. The second arrow indicates when the Sabin vaccine was licensed. Between the two, the rate of infection had already dropped by about 90%. That is just a small distance on this logarithmically calibrated chart. To try to clarify the scale of the change I included some charts that I made below from the same source.[3]
What would be nice would be a vaccine for autism. There just does not seem to be a viral cause for autism. Vaccines don’t appear to cause autism, either.
This chart above includes all of the data from 1944 to 1993. Since the data on the right side of the chart is invisible by comparison, I drew another chart, just leaving out the first 13 years of data. The red line is where the next chart begins, but with the scale adjusted so the largest number (the little red arrow) fills the chart.
Again the chart above includes the data from 1944 to 1993, except this has eliminated the 13 years from 1944 to 1956. This chart begins to show data where the red line was on the chart above. Since the data on the right is still almost invisible, I repeated the removal of data, one more time. The red line is where the next chart begins, again with the scale adjusted so the largest number (the little red arrow) fills the chart.
Again the chart above includes the data from 1944 to 1993, except this has eliminated the 18 years from 1944 to 1961. This chart begins to show data where the red line was on the chart above. Since the data on the right is just becoming visible, I repeated the removal of data, another time. The red line is where the next chart begins, again with the scale adjusted so the largest number (the little red arrow) fills the chart.
Again the chart above includes the data from 1944 to 1993, except this has eliminated the 20 years from 1944 to 1963. This chart begins to show data where the red line was on the chart above. The data on the right is still small. I repeated the removal of data, yet again. The red line is where the next chart begins, again with the scale adjusted so the largest number (the little red arrow) fills the chart. I only removed 2 more years
Again the chart above includes the data from 1944 to 1993, except this has eliminated the 30 years from 1944 to 1973. This chart begins to show data where the red line was on the chart above. Now the data on the right is clearly visible, but I repeated the removal of data, one last time. The red line is where the next chart begins, again with the scale adjusted so the largest numbers (the little red arrow) fills the chart.
Now to go back and show you the original chart. This chart includes red lines at all of the places where I readjusted the size on the chart. The chart goes from a high of over 50,000 to a low of 3. These numbers are not normally in the same ball park.
Why is this important? Why do I keep pointing out the effect of extremely large numbers?
Because people do not have a good grasp of the scale involved.
Scale is important in understanding science. Without an ability to put these numbers in perspective, we are missing out on the ability to grasp scientific concepts.
One more chart of polio. This is only paralytic polio, a subset of polio, but the numbers are similar. It goes to zero. No polio in the US. Soon, none anywhere in the world. Smallpox is still the only disease with that distinction.
Why do I use polio? Not just the ridiculous quote I started with. Polio does not exist in the US. Since the 1970’s the only cases of polio here have been vaccine related. 60 years ago, about 30,000 people in the US became sick with polio, each year. The human cost of eliminating polio from the US was high. There were people who acquired the disease from the vaccine. For those individuals, and their families, things did not seem to be better. For the families, their health actually was better, since they were not likely to be infected by that family member.
Since 1961 more people, in the US, have contracted polio from the vaccine than anything else. That is actually a success story. In 1977 when he said this, the number of cases of polio, could be counted on your fingers and toes. With some left over. If I were aware of the relative risks of getting polio from the vaccine and being protected from getting polio by the vaccine back in the 1950’s or 1960’s, of course I would get the vaccine. And I would have everyone in my family get it, too. It would be recklessly irresponsible not to. Vaccines work.
Footnotes:
^ 1 HISTORICAL FACTS EXPOSING THE DANGERS AND INEFFECTIVENESS OF VACCINES
This is the link to the site. Writing the title in all capital letters is just one of the charms of the author. He writes, Vaccines were not responsible for the decline in death rates from infectious disease and offer no protection whatsoever. and I have conducted seminars on these topics throughout Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom, and have an open challenge to any doctor in the world to publicly debate vaccination. Why would a doctor waste time on this embarrassingly oblivious author?
^ 2 eMedicine.com
Poliomyelitis
Benjamin Estrada, MD
Updated Aug 15, 2007
Article
^ 3 MMWR Summary of Notifiable Diseases, United States, 1993
October 21, 1994/42(53);1-73
Free Full Text
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I am wondering where the chart is that shows this info from 1920 or the earlier years? I was thinking you kept deleteing data to show what happened the 50 plus years before the vaccine was introduced as well as after….i feel this info is very important. Thank you.
That information is harder to find.
Polio did exist before then, but there do not appear to have been large outbreaks before 1894 in America.
http://amhistory.si.edu/polio/timeline/
There is a long, much more in depth, article in PubMed Central that may satisfy your curiosity. I have not yet had the time to read it. There is a lot of math, which probably can be skipped, while still providing useful information on the history of polio.
The Spatial Dynamics of Poliomyelitis in the United States: From Epidemic Emergence to Vaccine-Induced Retreat, 1910-1971.
Trevelyan B, Smallman-Raynor M, Cliff AD.
Ann Assoc Am Geogr. 2005 Jun;95(2):269-293.
PMID: 16741562 Free PMC Article
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1473032/
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Polio did not exist before then? That right there discredits anything you have to say! Polio has been around since ancient Egyptian times! Some mummies have shown evidence of this. However, the first detailed recorded case of polio was by Sir Walter Scott, who was infected in 1773. Your charts are incomplete and it’s not too hard to find REAL charts that show how in most places Polio was already on the decline before the vaccination was introduced. This article is a half-assed attempt on making vaccines the hero and it failed.
Where did I claim that polio did not exist before the time covered in the graphs (or before any other time)?
Polio rates fluctuated until the introduction of the first vaccine.
After the introduction of the vaccines, the rates disappeared.
You can claim that it was improved hygiene and sanitation, but the evidence shows that the rates of decrease in vaccine-preventable illnesses do not correlate with improvements in sanitation and hygiene. In stead, the vaccine introduction comes just before the most significant decreases in disease incidence.
Historical comparisons of morbidity and mortality for vaccine-preventable diseases in the United States.
Roush SW, et al. JAMA. 2007
Pubmed: 18000199
Even worse for the claim that vaccines didn’t cause the decreased incidences of vaccine-preventable illnesses is the return of these illnesses in outbreaks in under-vaccinated communities.
We don’t give children the smallpox vaccine because smallpox has been eradicated in spite of the objections of anti-vaxers.
The reason we continue to give children the polio vaccine is that anti-vaxers have prevented the eradication of polio.
Thanks, anti-vaxers.
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Your statements are false. Your tone is opinionated. You are not a credible source of information.
I provided evidence, which is something anti-vaxers avoid.
My opinion of people who reject reality, and endanger children, is negative.
Anti-vaxers reject reality. You claim that the evidence I provided is false, which is a rejection of reality.
Anti-vaxers discourage vaccination. Discouraging vaccination endangers children.
Vaccines are probably the safest and most effective medical interventions we have.
The reason there is a need to keep giving the polio vaccine to children is that anti-vaxers have prevented eradication of polio.
Smallpox was eradicated, in spite of opposition from anti-vaxers.
Children no longer need to receive smallpox vaccination, because of the success of the vaccine, in spite of opposition from anti-vaxers.
Stop rejecting reality.
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Wow your reality is all over the place. First you say anti vaxxers are the reason we haven’t been able to eradicate a supposedly eradicated disease. Then you say that small pox was eradicated in spite of the opposition from anti vaxxers…if that’s the case why can’t the vaccine fully eradicate polio “in spite of” the unvaccinated? You’re basing your reality off of studies that are done with no placebo and conducted by the vaccine companies while ignoring that billions of dollars have been paid out for vaccine injury. You’re also ignoring the fact that we have a country full of sick people despite our advanced medical technology. Cigarettes and heroin were once considered safe and recommended by doctors which we all know was an error in judgment. You are the only one rejecting reality and factual information. Maybe if you spent your time actually analyzing information from both sides instead of creating graphs based on bias research you would have a clearer sense of what’s actually real.
Anonymous,
That is a great introduction to your all over the place rejection of reality comment.
Only two diseases have been eradicated – smallpox and rinderpest. Both were eradicated by vaccination.
Polio has not yet been eradicated. You are a liar.
Polio will eventually be eradicated in spite of opposition from you anti-vaxers.
Smallpox took longer to eradicate than it should have, because you anti-vaxers opposed vaccination. Millions of children died, because of you anti-vaxers.
You are the one who is all over the place and clearly you are a liar.
You claimed that the research is only done by the drug companies, but clearly you are a liar.
You claimed studies that are done with no placebo, but there were almost half a million children in the placebo-controlled part of this one study, so clearly you are a liar.
There are plenty of other placebo-controlled vaccine studies
All of the deaths were in the children who did not receive the actual vaccine.
You are advocating for a study with one group at higher risk of death because of not receiving the vaccine. There is no known benefit to withholding the vaccine and there is plenty of evidence of greater risk from withholding the vaccine. You are advocating to put children in unnecessary danger.
The National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program was created in order to keep vaccines available, because frivolous lawsuits were being filed by you anti-vaxers. Congress recognized that the complaints of a bunch of liars should not endanger the lives of American children, or the children elsewhere in the world. In order to compensate children who might have been harmed by vaccines, a no-fault fund was set up. Many of you anti-vaxers claim that a change to the legal system is somehow medical evidence. You are a liar.
National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program
Naturopaths strike again.
Naturopaths won’t be happy as long as there are healthy people in America.
Both were errors in judgment, based on a lack of good evidence.
Vaccines are supported by excellent evidence of efficacy and safety.
I have proved plenty of evidence that you are a liar. Your claims are not supported by evidence – you haven’t even attempted to provide any valid evidence to support your claims.
You are claiming that the number of polio cases is biased?
Provide valid evidence to support your claim.
Do not provide links to anti-vax propaganda sites. This is a site that reviews valid medical evidence. Look at the rest of what I write and you will see that I am very critical of exaggerated claims from drug companies.
Your claims of bias are lies, like the rest of your claims.
Feel free to disagree, but provide valid evidence if you don’t want to be ridiculed even more.
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