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Polio: An American Story
All who lived in the early 1950s remember the fear of polio and the elation felt when a successful vaccine was found. Now David Oshinsky tells the gripping story of the polio terror and of the intense effort to find a cure, from the March of Dimes to the discovery of the Salk and Sabin vaccines--and beyond. Here is a remarkable portrait of America in the early 1950s, using the widespread panic over polio to shed light on our national obsessions and fears. Drawing on newly available papers of Jonas Salk, Albert Sabin and other key players, Oshinsky paints a suspenseful portrait of the race for the cure, weaving a dramatic tale centered on the furious rivalry between Salk and Sabin. Indeed, the competition was marked by a deep-seated ill will among the researchers that remained with them until their deaths. The author also tells the story of Isabel Morgan, perhaps the most talented of all polio researchers, who might have beaten Salk to the prize if she had not retired to raise a family. As backdrop to this feverish research, Oshinsky offers an insightful look at the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, which was founded in the 1930s by FDR and Basil O'Connor. The National Foundation revolutionized fundraising and the perception of disease in America, using "poster children" and the famous March of Dimes to raise hundreds of millions of dollars from a vast army of contributors (instead of a few well-heeled benefactors), creating the largest research and rehabilitation network in the history of medicine. The polio experience also revolutionized the way in which the government licensed and tested new drugs before allowing them on the market, and the way in which the legal system dealt with manufacturers' liability for unsafe products. Finally, and perhaps most tellingly, Oshinsky reveals that polio was never the raging epidemic portrayed by the media, but in truth a relatively uncommon disease. But in baby-booming America--increasingly suburban, family-oriented, and hygiene-obsessed--the specter of polio, like the specter of the atomic bomb, soon became a cloud of terror over daily life. Both a gripping scientific suspense story and a provocative social and cultural history, Polio opens a fresh window onto postwar America.
342 pages, Hardcover
First published April 1, 2005
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About the author
David M. Oshinsky
38 books145 followersDavid M. Oshinsky is the director of the Division of Medical Humanities at NYU School of Medicine and a professor in the Department of History at New York University.
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June 11, 2019
School is finally out for the summer later this week. According to my reading challenge, the last four books I have read have been baseball related. It has been a busy time to say the least and I am salivating at the premise of being able to read more ahem quality non fiction. One ongoing challenge of mine that has been sidetracked but not forgotten is reading Pulitzer winners. With the school year about to end, I finally got to read another award winner as part of a buddy read in the nonfiction book club. Polio: An American Story by David E. Oshinsky won the 2006 nonfiction award. Telling the story of the eradication of polio through a historical lens, I was able to overcome my general squeamishness toward all things medical and participate in the buddy read.
The year 1954 gave the United States the first test trials of the polio vaccine. In the media, the event was lauded as a great medical breakthrough. My parents were in kindergarten at the time and among the hundreds of thousands of children given the vaccine as test subjects. Prior to 1954, polio was considered a fatal disease with cases numbering in five digits during the worst epidemic years. Scientists note that polio was at its worst in advanced countries that enjoyed the spoils of a modern society- soap, heightened sanitation, and less germs. Outbreaks occurred in urban centers, and the 1916 epidemic in New York City touched thousands of children. Those with means fled to the countryside, but polio struck many of those who stayed. Parents were alarmed each spring and summer and took strict measures, keeping their children inside, yet the disease took its toll each year with no cure in sight.
The most famous of polio victims was President Franklin Roosevelt, who was stricken on a family vacation in northern Maine when he was at the prime of life. Paralyzed from the waist down at the worst of his diagnosis, FDR spent the rest of his political career hiding his paralysis from the American public. When it was apparent that he would be nominated as governor of New York in 1928, FDR was determined to find a cure for his affliction and found one in the waters of Warm Springs, Georgia. It was there that he spent 116 of the next 208 weeks away from his family as FDR used the retreat in an attempt to walk again. His case was one of the fortunate ones, however, as children faced a life in an iron lung, leg braces, or being confined to a wheelchair as well as countless fatalities. As the quality of life in the United States improves, the chasm between polio cases within her borders versus the rest of the world widened.
With FDR as the face of the disease, his law partner Basil O’Connor was tabbed to run the National Polio Foundation with its headquarters in both New York and Warm Springs. O’Connor enlisted Hollywood celebrities who admired FDR to lend their names to the cause, and one came up with the name March of Dimes as its fundraising arm. Each year on FDR’s birthday hundreds of thousands of dimes arrived at the White House as the American public contributed in what little means they had to help communities ravaged by the disease. The funds went to assist families who had children stricken by polio but also funded scientists who were in a race to develop a long sought after vaccine to eradicate the disease. It is this race that lead to a lifetime rivalry between two key virologists as they sought to become the first to develop a cure for this deadly disease.
Today children receive two polio shots as infants and polio is wiped out in all but a few pockets of Africa and Southeast Asia. This was not always the case. During the 1940s Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin raced to see who would develop a polio vaccine first. Oshinsky interspersed the science behind the polio vaccine with the history of the time period making Polio: An American Story a compelling read. Salk was the poster boy of the National Foundation and was willing to lose his anonymity to connect with the American people. He favored a killed virus vaccine as he noted that the presence of live virus could lead to more polio epidemics. While the favorite of the media, Salk irked the scientific community who believed that the best scientists should stay anonymous in their labs. As a result, Salk was never inducted into the National Academy of Sciences despite his achievement. Biologists viewed Salk as a less than stellar member of the field. The leader of this view was Albert Sabin, an at times pompous self centered scientist who rivaled Salk for fame and glory. Sabin favored a live virus vaccine and denounced Salk at every opportunity he could. Their rivalry would last for the rest of the their lives, yet, in the early 1950s, the race to find the first vaccine that worked was on and the rivalry was intense.
In many historical books and memoirs I have read of the 1940s and early 1950s, the fear of polio was real. Children were not allowed out of their homes in the summer and if they went to swimming pools they had to dry off and change out of their swimming suits immediately. One generation later having had the vaccine as a baby, the fear of swimming pools was something I never had to experience. Yet, to my parents and their contemporaries not being able to swim for the first six summers of their life was a reality. Perhaps if FDR was not stricken by polio, then the race to find a vaccine would not have been as immediate. Scientists at the time were focused on finding an influenza vaccine and cared more about quality than swiftness. Today there is a FDR memorial in Washington, D.C. that depicts him both standing and in a wheelchair. It was through his National Foundation that funding for research took off.
Polio: An American Story was a compelling read that gave readers a sense of the prevailing views of the time period and the race to develop a vaccine. Today both the Salk and Sabin versions of the vaccine are used in parts of the world as there is indeed merit in both live and killed virus vaccines. Oshinsky did impeccable research and as one more inclined to read history books, I felt he discussed the scientific sections without getting too advanced for my tastes. Oshinsky is a history professor at the University of Texas and has written other books about the 1950s, his preferred time period of research. Polio is a breakthrough in that it combines history and science and focuses on a disease as a main character, yet another Pulitzer winner I can cross off my list.
4 stars
The year 1954 gave the United States the first test trials of the polio vaccine. In the media, the event was lauded as a great medical breakthrough. My parents were in kindergarten at the time and among the hundreds of thousands of children given the vaccine as test subjects. Prior to 1954, polio was considered a fatal disease with cases numbering in five digits during the worst epidemic years. Scientists note that polio was at its worst in advanced countries that enjoyed the spoils of a modern society- soap, heightened sanitation, and less germs. Outbreaks occurred in urban centers, and the 1916 epidemic in New York City touched thousands of children. Those with means fled to the countryside, but polio struck many of those who stayed. Parents were alarmed each spring and summer and took strict measures, keeping their children inside, yet the disease took its toll each year with no cure in sight.
The most famous of polio victims was President Franklin Roosevelt, who was stricken on a family vacation in northern Maine when he was at the prime of life. Paralyzed from the waist down at the worst of his diagnosis, FDR spent the rest of his political career hiding his paralysis from the American public. When it was apparent that he would be nominated as governor of New York in 1928, FDR was determined to find a cure for his affliction and found one in the waters of Warm Springs, Georgia. It was there that he spent 116 of the next 208 weeks away from his family as FDR used the retreat in an attempt to walk again. His case was one of the fortunate ones, however, as children faced a life in an iron lung, leg braces, or being confined to a wheelchair as well as countless fatalities. As the quality of life in the United States improves, the chasm between polio cases within her borders versus the rest of the world widened.
With FDR as the face of the disease, his law partner Basil O’Connor was tabbed to run the National Polio Foundation with its headquarters in both New York and Warm Springs. O’Connor enlisted Hollywood celebrities who admired FDR to lend their names to the cause, and one came up with the name March of Dimes as its fundraising arm. Each year on FDR’s birthday hundreds of thousands of dimes arrived at the White House as the American public contributed in what little means they had to help communities ravaged by the disease. The funds went to assist families who had children stricken by polio but also funded scientists who were in a race to develop a long sought after vaccine to eradicate the disease. It is this race that lead to a lifetime rivalry between two key virologists as they sought to become the first to develop a cure for this deadly disease.
Today children receive two polio shots as infants and polio is wiped out in all but a few pockets of Africa and Southeast Asia. This was not always the case. During the 1940s Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin raced to see who would develop a polio vaccine first. Oshinsky interspersed the science behind the polio vaccine with the history of the time period making Polio: An American Story a compelling read. Salk was the poster boy of the National Foundation and was willing to lose his anonymity to connect with the American people. He favored a killed virus vaccine as he noted that the presence of live virus could lead to more polio epidemics. While the favorite of the media, Salk irked the scientific community who believed that the best scientists should stay anonymous in their labs. As a result, Salk was never inducted into the National Academy of Sciences despite his achievement. Biologists viewed Salk as a less than stellar member of the field. The leader of this view was Albert Sabin, an at times pompous self centered scientist who rivaled Salk for fame and glory. Sabin favored a live virus vaccine and denounced Salk at every opportunity he could. Their rivalry would last for the rest of the their lives, yet, in the early 1950s, the race to find the first vaccine that worked was on and the rivalry was intense.
In many historical books and memoirs I have read of the 1940s and early 1950s, the fear of polio was real. Children were not allowed out of their homes in the summer and if they went to swimming pools they had to dry off and change out of their swimming suits immediately. One generation later having had the vaccine as a baby, the fear of swimming pools was something I never had to experience. Yet, to my parents and their contemporaries not being able to swim for the first six summers of their life was a reality. Perhaps if FDR was not stricken by polio, then the race to find a vaccine would not have been as immediate. Scientists at the time were focused on finding an influenza vaccine and cared more about quality than swiftness. Today there is a FDR memorial in Washington, D.C. that depicts him both standing and in a wheelchair. It was through his National Foundation that funding for research took off.
Polio: An American Story was a compelling read that gave readers a sense of the prevailing views of the time period and the race to develop a vaccine. Today both the Salk and Sabin versions of the vaccine are used in parts of the world as there is indeed merit in both live and killed virus vaccines. Oshinsky did impeccable research and as one more inclined to read history books, I felt he discussed the scientific sections without getting too advanced for my tastes. Oshinsky is a history professor at the University of Texas and has written other books about the 1950s, his preferred time period of research. Polio is a breakthrough in that it combines history and science and focuses on a disease as a main character, yet another Pulitzer winner I can cross off my list.
4 stars
December 8, 2025
Polio: An American Story is a fascinating narrative nonfiction journey about polio in the 1930s - 1960s and the fight to find an effective vaccine. This book won the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in History.
The book opens with a scene in 1949 in San Angelo, Texas with one case. Within days, concern had turned into alarm. There were 25 cases and 7 deaths. Then it ballooned to 61 cases.
Residents were told to avoid crowds, wash their hands, and stay out of swimming pools. Lockdowns started occurring. Bars and bowling alleys were closed. High school athletic events were cancelled. (Sounds eerily familiar to the COVID pandemic.)
Oshinsky states that no disease drew as much attention, or struck the same terror, as polio. Polio hit without warning.
Immigrants were blamed for the disease. Initially it was thought that unsanitary conditions and dense living quarters caused the spread of polio. However, well-nourished children in wealthier neighborhoods frequently got polio more often than immigrant children. Children had to obtain travel certificates proving they were polio free. Some cities posted signs that children under the age of 16 were not allowed to travel into their cities. One newspaper headline indicated that 72,000 cats were killed due to fear of polio being spread by cats.
The March of Dimes turned polio into the most feared affliction of its time. Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) got polio at the age of 39. Without FDR, the great polio crusade would never have happened. The March of Dimes made polio seem more ominous and more curable than other diseases. Its strategy revolutionized the way charities raise funds.
Maricopa County, Arizona created a Mother's March on Polio that was later replicated in many cities I reside in Maricopa County and did not know this piece of history.
The quest for a vaccine primarily focused on Jonas Salk, Albert Sabin, and Hilary Koprowski. Isabel Morgan was also one of the early trailblazers, but she stepped aside to raise her family.
The feud between Salk and Sabin outlasted both of their lives.
Oshinsky is a terrific author and researcher. I plan on reading several of his other books.
The book opens with a scene in 1949 in San Angelo, Texas with one case. Within days, concern had turned into alarm. There were 25 cases and 7 deaths. Then it ballooned to 61 cases.
Residents were told to avoid crowds, wash their hands, and stay out of swimming pools. Lockdowns started occurring. Bars and bowling alleys were closed. High school athletic events were cancelled. (Sounds eerily familiar to the COVID pandemic.)
Oshinsky states that no disease drew as much attention, or struck the same terror, as polio. Polio hit without warning.
Immigrants were blamed for the disease. Initially it was thought that unsanitary conditions and dense living quarters caused the spread of polio. However, well-nourished children in wealthier neighborhoods frequently got polio more often than immigrant children. Children had to obtain travel certificates proving they were polio free. Some cities posted signs that children under the age of 16 were not allowed to travel into their cities. One newspaper headline indicated that 72,000 cats were killed due to fear of polio being spread by cats.
The March of Dimes turned polio into the most feared affliction of its time. Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) got polio at the age of 39. Without FDR, the great polio crusade would never have happened. The March of Dimes made polio seem more ominous and more curable than other diseases. Its strategy revolutionized the way charities raise funds.
Maricopa County, Arizona created a Mother's March on Polio that was later replicated in many cities I reside in Maricopa County and did not know this piece of history.
The quest for a vaccine primarily focused on Jonas Salk, Albert Sabin, and Hilary Koprowski. Isabel Morgan was also one of the early trailblazers, but she stepped aside to raise her family.
The feud between Salk and Sabin outlasted both of their lives.
Oshinsky is a terrific author and researcher. I plan on reading several of his other books.
May 17, 2021
Did the 20th Century see any other disease like poliomyelitis? Unlike consumption or cholera, it was not the by-product of a poor and polluted society, but of a crowded and fairly clean one, which is why the most dangerous time for the disease was in summer, when children sometimes went from public pools to iron lungs rather than summer camps. Unlike maladies with histories that stretched far into the past, mass outbreaks of polio were fairly rare until about 100 years ago, making early efforts at analysis and cure often mystifying.
On the other hand, polio had a few things going for it: a sponsor/martyr/patron saint (FDR); a large scientific establishment, including Drs. Salk and Sabin; an enormous national effort after the end of World War Two; mass trials and inoculations with very little citizen protest; a nationally recognized charity (the March of Dimes); and when all was said and done, its own coinage (the F.D.R. dime) -- not to mention the gratitude and thanks of the world that go on until now.
POLIO: AN AMERICAN STORY by David M. Oshinsky (who also wrote Bellevue: Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America’s Most Storied Hospital) tells this complex story entertainingly and very well. Especially in these times, when it is unsure whether the breakthrough anti-Covid vaccine will find fast mass acceptance, it is a very encouraging story too.
from the book:
In truth, it was the model of Democratic Canada -- not Communist Russia -- that the drug companies feared most. To the north, the government had taken over immediate control of the polio vaccine with overwhelming popular support. The job was easier; Canada had far fewer children to inoculate. But the government-approved vaccine would prove to be safe and cheap and plentiful -- a testimony, it appeared, to months of meticulous planning by the Ministry of Health. In Canada, polio was viewed as a national crisis requiring an appropriate national response. (p. 219)
On the other hand, polio had a few things going for it: a sponsor/martyr/patron saint (FDR); a large scientific establishment, including Drs. Salk and Sabin; an enormous national effort after the end of World War Two; mass trials and inoculations with very little citizen protest; a nationally recognized charity (the March of Dimes); and when all was said and done, its own coinage (the F.D.R. dime) -- not to mention the gratitude and thanks of the world that go on until now.
POLIO: AN AMERICAN STORY by David M. Oshinsky (who also wrote Bellevue: Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America’s Most Storied Hospital) tells this complex story entertainingly and very well. Especially in these times, when it is unsure whether the breakthrough anti-Covid vaccine will find fast mass acceptance, it is a very encouraging story too.
from the book:
In truth, it was the model of Democratic Canada -- not Communist Russia -- that the drug companies feared most. To the north, the government had taken over immediate control of the polio vaccine with overwhelming popular support. The job was easier; Canada had far fewer children to inoculate. But the government-approved vaccine would prove to be safe and cheap and plentiful -- a testimony, it appeared, to months of meticulous planning by the Ministry of Health. In Canada, polio was viewed as a national crisis requiring an appropriate national response. (p. 219)
January 22, 2009
My older brother died before I was born due to bulbar polio in 1949. As a result, my parents decided to try again so I can say I am here due to polio.
Naturally this book caught my eye when I spotted in on a friend's bookshelf and reading it I discovered how little I knew about the disease and the people involved with finding a cure.
The book can be divided into two parts - the first dealing with the period up to the death of FDR (who had the disease) and the second dealing with the effort to find a vaccine.
In common with several other accounts of scientific pursuits, the search for a polio vaccine features the usual personality conflicts and large egos that place emphasis on MY discoveries and MY work rather than the overall effort. Scientists are people and can be just as petty and self-serving as anyone else. But, through competition come the benefits we all enjoy when the personal feuds are long forgotten.
The March of Dimes, Jonas Salk and the peculiar word bulbar that refers to the most deadly manifestation of the disease are all words that I recall hearing when I was a wee lad, so I read with great interest about them. Remarkably, the entire organization and money-raising effort that brought the Salk vaccine in 1954 was almost completely free of either government or American Medical Association
involvement. How times have changed!
Easy to read and fast moving, the book will keep you wondering what twists the story will take and twist it certainly does, but explained in a way that won't leave you confused. Polio is a competent job of history writing and, though not a book I'd keep for my library, reading it was time well spent.
Naturally this book caught my eye when I spotted in on a friend's bookshelf and reading it I discovered how little I knew about the disease and the people involved with finding a cure.
The book can be divided into two parts - the first dealing with the period up to the death of FDR (who had the disease) and the second dealing with the effort to find a vaccine.
In common with several other accounts of scientific pursuits, the search for a polio vaccine features the usual personality conflicts and large egos that place emphasis on MY discoveries and MY work rather than the overall effort. Scientists are people and can be just as petty and self-serving as anyone else. But, through competition come the benefits we all enjoy when the personal feuds are long forgotten.
The March of Dimes, Jonas Salk and the peculiar word bulbar that refers to the most deadly manifestation of the disease are all words that I recall hearing when I was a wee lad, so I read with great interest about them. Remarkably, the entire organization and money-raising effort that brought the Salk vaccine in 1954 was almost completely free of either government or American Medical Association
involvement. How times have changed!
Easy to read and fast moving, the book will keep you wondering what twists the story will take and twist it certainly does, but explained in a way that won't leave you confused. Polio is a competent job of history writing and, though not a book I'd keep for my library, reading it was time well spent.
February 4, 2024
Polio by David Oshinsky garnered him a Pulitzer Prize in 2006. It is a highly readable and concise history. The writing style is fluid and the content is very interesting. Although this book is more than a decade old the search for an effective polio vaccine resonated in the midst of the Corona Virus scare and potential pandemic.
My attachment to this book is also personal and I wish to share a short story.
My mother contracted polio in August 1955 and was hospitalized. At the time she was also pregnant with my older brother. She initially suffered paralysis in her left arm but was able to give birth to a healthy baby and four more children as years passed. She regained the use of her arm but had some permanent damage to her hand. As a boy I can vividly remember seeing her as she unconsciously rubbed at her hand where her muscle had wasted away from the disease — a reminder of this frightening time in her life. She was an amateur portrait artist and had a vigor for life and not one to complain.
She had contracted poliomyelitis while in Germany — my dad was serving in the Army there during the Cold War. The prevalence of polio was quite high in Europe and the U.S during that period. In the U.S. that year some 60,000 people a year came down with polio while nearly a half million others were exposed to the virus each year. Only 1-2 % of those exposed would suffer from paralysis.
It would be many years before vaccines were given to adults and too late for my mother. After all 2/3 of the cases of polio were among children and they were the target group for vaccinations. There were also delays as there were some bad batches of vaccines — including the Cutter batch which tragically was given to many children in the Pacific NW before the distribution was stopped. This period — after the trial — was focused on a commercial vaccine and is well covered in the book.
Polio was a world wide health crisis and millions of people become disabled and some died. The generations that followed, like mine, owe Dr. Salk a great deal of gratitude because he foresaw the usefulness and efficacy of using dead viruses. In spite of the critics and naysayers he was able to prove that his method worked. Salk did possess a personality that rarely gave praise to anyone including himself and so he did not always help his cause politically. Not an endearing man but like a good researcher he remained laser focused amidst the critics.
Interestingly Salk would eventually lose the commercial battle of the dead virus inoculation method versus using live viruses.
5 stars. Oshinsky does a great job of presenting this story in a fair and balanced way.
My attachment to this book is also personal and I wish to share a short story.
My mother contracted polio in August 1955 and was hospitalized. At the time she was also pregnant with my older brother. She initially suffered paralysis in her left arm but was able to give birth to a healthy baby and four more children as years passed. She regained the use of her arm but had some permanent damage to her hand. As a boy I can vividly remember seeing her as she unconsciously rubbed at her hand where her muscle had wasted away from the disease — a reminder of this frightening time in her life. She was an amateur portrait artist and had a vigor for life and not one to complain.
She had contracted poliomyelitis while in Germany — my dad was serving in the Army there during the Cold War. The prevalence of polio was quite high in Europe and the U.S during that period. In the U.S. that year some 60,000 people a year came down with polio while nearly a half million others were exposed to the virus each year. Only 1-2 % of those exposed would suffer from paralysis.
It would be many years before vaccines were given to adults and too late for my mother. After all 2/3 of the cases of polio were among children and they were the target group for vaccinations. There were also delays as there were some bad batches of vaccines — including the Cutter batch which tragically was given to many children in the Pacific NW before the distribution was stopped. This period — after the trial — was focused on a commercial vaccine and is well covered in the book.
Polio was a world wide health crisis and millions of people become disabled and some died. The generations that followed, like mine, owe Dr. Salk a great deal of gratitude because he foresaw the usefulness and efficacy of using dead viruses. In spite of the critics and naysayers he was able to prove that his method worked. Salk did possess a personality that rarely gave praise to anyone including himself and so he did not always help his cause politically. Not an endearing man but like a good researcher he remained laser focused amidst the critics.
Interestingly Salk would eventually lose the commercial battle of the dead virus inoculation method versus using live viruses.
5 stars. Oshinsky does a great job of presenting this story in a fair and balanced way.
March 24, 2020
This book was very interesting and enlightening.
I wish I could spend more time writing a full review of it, but I've been working 10-12 hour days at work this past week and would rather read than write. But a few key points:
1) I learned a lot about FDR's role in the whole Polio issue. I knew that he was on the dime bcause of the March of Dimes---a campaign to raise money to find the cure. The actual history was interesting.
2) The history and rivalry between Salk and Sabin was rivoting. Salk won the race to finding the cure, but his cure involved inactive (dead) polio virus. After a SNAFU with the Salk vaccine, Sabine's live virus otpion became the go to. But the race didn't necessarily end with their successes.
Controvery and bitterment lasted for their lifetimes. Salk's vaccine (thanks to shoddy pharmacuetical practices) lead to many problems including doubt about the cure. Sabine's worked faster, but wasn't without concerns.
In the end, one of the big take aways, in light of the current COVID Crisis is that finding the cure isn't the end of the road if the solution isn't properly vetted.
I wish I could spend more time writing a full review of it, but I've been working 10-12 hour days at work this past week and would rather read than write. But a few key points:
1) I learned a lot about FDR's role in the whole Polio issue. I knew that he was on the dime bcause of the March of Dimes---a campaign to raise money to find the cure. The actual history was interesting.
2) The history and rivalry between Salk and Sabin was rivoting. Salk won the race to finding the cure, but his cure involved inactive (dead) polio virus. After a SNAFU with the Salk vaccine, Sabine's live virus otpion became the go to. But the race didn't necessarily end with their successes.
Controvery and bitterment lasted for their lifetimes. Salk's vaccine (thanks to shoddy pharmacuetical practices) lead to many problems including doubt about the cure. Sabine's worked faster, but wasn't without concerns.
In the end, one of the big take aways, in light of the current COVID Crisis is that finding the cure isn't the end of the road if the solution isn't properly vetted.
February 6, 2024
Oshinsky's rich narrative traces the history of the polio (also called "infantile paralysis"), and the burgeoning field of virology, and biomedical research in the 20th-century United States. Many of the early chapters highlight the seasonal outbreaks of the polio virus in the US and the surges of numbers of children (and adults) who contracted the virus during these peak times of warm and hot weather.
The correlation between open water / outside activities was identified early on, even as the vectors remained unclear, later closely linked to fecal matter in water - swimming pools, ponds - and carried on the legs of common insects like houseflies. In the times before indoor plumbing and central air, it is no wonder that the virus was so rampant.
Polio was well-known and observed in young populations (infants to age 6 were highly susceptible), but it was also contractable by adults, and this became more publicly recognized as Franklin Roosevelt contracted the virus while swimming in the coastal waters of New Brunswick, Canada. Then a rising politician, he did not want his medical condition to be noted publicly, and the press seemingly went along with this, rarely showing the president using his walking aids and devices or in his wheelchair. FDR advocated for polio treatments and care, most notably establishing a treatment/wellness center at a natural hot springs in Georgia for other polio victims.
At this time post-Depression and wartime, philanthropy and fundraising drives were uncommon, but Oshinsky delves into the history and formation of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis and their massive fundraising campaign, The March of Dimes. This was some of the first instances of national/international marketing for medical research, and celebrity-driven philanthropy, with major Hollywood stars lending their voices.
The latter half of the book focuses on the drive for a vaccine, vaccine trials and ethics, and the rivalries and politicking between researchers, institutions, and philanthropic foundations that lasted for decades. While there were many players in the race for a vaccine (Oshinsky notes them all and the differences in their research) the two personalities that are most well-known are Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin. They had very different approaches (e.g. killed virus vs. live virus - immunizations vs. oral inoculation) and were hailed as saviors and saints for their research.
Some other topics and highlights covered in Oshinsky's POLIO:
- The US federal government's standoff approach as push-back against socialized medicine and "Red Scare" politics of the 1940/50s
- Personal stories of families and individuals struck by polio, including the man that permanently lived in an Iron Lung device, families with multiple children stricken by polio, etc.
- Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania's "turnaround" from industrial city to biomedical/tech hub started in this age and with Salk's appointment at University of Pittsburgh
- Human testing and medical ethics - early and late-stage trials of the vaccines on institutionalized children in special needs homes, and prisoners. Researchers testing on themselves and their families, etc. and testing in other countries (including the Belgian Congo, the USSR, Northern Ireland)
- Salk's relationship with J. Robert Oppenheimer, and the emulation of Oppenheimer's Institute at Princeton, finally establishing the Salk Institute in La Jolla, California.
Fascinating and very readable history! POLIO: An American History won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 2006.
4.25/5*
The correlation between open water / outside activities was identified early on, even as the vectors remained unclear, later closely linked to fecal matter in water - swimming pools, ponds - and carried on the legs of common insects like houseflies. In the times before indoor plumbing and central air, it is no wonder that the virus was so rampant.
Polio was well-known and observed in young populations (infants to age 6 were highly susceptible), but it was also contractable by adults, and this became more publicly recognized as Franklin Roosevelt contracted the virus while swimming in the coastal waters of New Brunswick, Canada. Then a rising politician, he did not want his medical condition to be noted publicly, and the press seemingly went along with this, rarely showing the president using his walking aids and devices or in his wheelchair. FDR advocated for polio treatments and care, most notably establishing a treatment/wellness center at a natural hot springs in Georgia for other polio victims.
At this time post-Depression and wartime, philanthropy and fundraising drives were uncommon, but Oshinsky delves into the history and formation of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis and their massive fundraising campaign, The March of Dimes. This was some of the first instances of national/international marketing for medical research, and celebrity-driven philanthropy, with major Hollywood stars lending their voices.
The latter half of the book focuses on the drive for a vaccine, vaccine trials and ethics, and the rivalries and politicking between researchers, institutions, and philanthropic foundations that lasted for decades. While there were many players in the race for a vaccine (Oshinsky notes them all and the differences in their research) the two personalities that are most well-known are Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin. They had very different approaches (e.g. killed virus vs. live virus - immunizations vs. oral inoculation) and were hailed as saviors and saints for their research.
Some other topics and highlights covered in Oshinsky's POLIO:
- The US federal government's standoff approach as push-back against socialized medicine and "Red Scare" politics of the 1940/50s
- Personal stories of families and individuals struck by polio, including the man that permanently lived in an Iron Lung device, families with multiple children stricken by polio, etc.
- Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania's "turnaround" from industrial city to biomedical/tech hub started in this age and with Salk's appointment at University of Pittsburgh
- Human testing and medical ethics - early and late-stage trials of the vaccines on institutionalized children in special needs homes, and prisoners. Researchers testing on themselves and their families, etc. and testing in other countries (including the Belgian Congo, the USSR, Northern Ireland)
- Salk's relationship with J. Robert Oppenheimer, and the emulation of Oppenheimer's Institute at Princeton, finally establishing the Salk Institute in La Jolla, California.
Fascinating and very readable history! POLIO: An American History won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 2006.
4.25/5*
July 20, 2024
I enjoy learning history, but so much more from a narrative non-fiction book such as this one, than a typical dry history text. This book was a slice of Americana for me, because it told the story of a disease that hit the US hard mid-century, (which also happens to be a history sweet spot for me). I was born mid 1960s, but I still remember hearing about the dreaded polio and seeing people who had been affected by this scary disease which seemed to stalk childhood. I saw kids in iron lungs in old magazines - it terrified and mesmerized me at the same time. I heard stories from my mom about how public pools could spread polio, and public places like theaters being closed during summer months to help fight the spread of polio. Anyway, hearing about this time period - 40s-60s, the cut throat race to find a vaccine (Sabin vs. Salk), and the missteps along the way (some vaccines literally GAVE kids polio!), as well as questions arising even today about the medium used for growing the vaccine (monkey kidneys) actually harming people down the road with unusual cancers, and of course, the AIDS origin theory, made this one a super fascinated read! Recommended. Listened to on audio.
September 5, 2012
I know it’s become cliché, particularly in my reviews, to say that a history book reads like a novel, but this one really does, and not just a contemplative novel, but a page-turning drama. The protagonist is Dr. Jonas Salk and he and rival scientist Dr. Albert Sabin are in a race to conquer a truly frightening enemy: the polio epidemic.
Having read Laser, I suppose I shouldn’t have been shocked that science is as ego-driven as any other pursuit, but the self-interest of the scientists was pretty appalling, especially when the risks were so high. Dr. Salk definitely lost luster in my eyes, and Dr. Sabin was even worse. But lest I give the wrong impression, the book covers much more than those two and their race to the vaccine. It begins with the rise of germ theory in the early 20th century and then takes us to the first polio epidemic of 1916. It explores FDR’s conflicted relationship with his handicap and the founding of the March of Dimes. My favorite “minor character” was Sister Elizabeth Kenny, an Australian nurse who took on the medical establishment with her unorthodox but highly effective physical therapy treatments. She was a celebrity in her time, and a movie was made about her life. I think it’s time for a remake. After all, “The King’s Speech” covered the unorthodox Australian speech therapist, Lionel Logue.
I recommend this book particularly to people who aren’t in the habit of reading history. It covers the 20th century, so it’s close enough to most of us to be somewhat familiar, if only through history classes and films. At the same time, though, it’s a different world – a time when kids weren’t free to go out to play for fear of spending the rest of their lives in an iron lung. The people are multi-dimensional, and you get a sense of dialogue because the author quotes extensively from interviews. I admit I didn’t “get” all the science, but the book is what it says: the story of how the American people banded together to wipe out one terrible threat. May Hashem help us to rise to face our current challenges with such unity.
Having read Laser, I suppose I shouldn’t have been shocked that science is as ego-driven as any other pursuit, but the self-interest of the scientists was pretty appalling, especially when the risks were so high. Dr. Salk definitely lost luster in my eyes, and Dr. Sabin was even worse. But lest I give the wrong impression, the book covers much more than those two and their race to the vaccine. It begins with the rise of germ theory in the early 20th century and then takes us to the first polio epidemic of 1916. It explores FDR’s conflicted relationship with his handicap and the founding of the March of Dimes. My favorite “minor character” was Sister Elizabeth Kenny, an Australian nurse who took on the medical establishment with her unorthodox but highly effective physical therapy treatments. She was a celebrity in her time, and a movie was made about her life. I think it’s time for a remake. After all, “The King’s Speech” covered the unorthodox Australian speech therapist, Lionel Logue.
I recommend this book particularly to people who aren’t in the habit of reading history. It covers the 20th century, so it’s close enough to most of us to be somewhat familiar, if only through history classes and films. At the same time, though, it’s a different world – a time when kids weren’t free to go out to play for fear of spending the rest of their lives in an iron lung. The people are multi-dimensional, and you get a sense of dialogue because the author quotes extensively from interviews. I admit I didn’t “get” all the science, but the book is what it says: the story of how the American people banded together to wipe out one terrible threat. May Hashem help us to rise to face our current challenges with such unity.
June 20, 2019
Thoughts soon.
February 15, 2009
As has been said, this book reads like a mystery. Fascinating details about the disease, its history, the times, the medicine, the pain, the people who fought to eradicate it and the politics. I realized that I was one of the children on whom the vaccine was tested in 1954. I remember clearly being taken in to the cafeteria at St. Austin's School and being lined up to get the shot. I am told I cried but don't remember that part! Of course, at eight years, I had no idea of the controversy and the risk. I would give a lot to be able to talk to my father, a physician, about his thinking, giving permission to be in the pilot test, and the risks.
January 31, 2020
The story of polio by Oshinsky captured the high stakes profile and the intense terror of this disease in the efforts to find a cure from the March of Dimes and the vaccines by Salk, Sabin and others. It reads like a novel and is fast reading and very enlightening and insightful. It was especially interesting for me to get the backstory of how the vaccine came to be and the financial struggles to fund them as I had a family member and friend with polio.
The National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis was founded in the 1930’s by FDR and Basil O’Connor to help defeat this illness which FDR contracted in his late 30’s. The history of polio was explored in depth and with insight. The three major competitors for creating the vaccine were Dr. Jonas Salk, Dr. Albert Sabin, and Dr. Hilary Koprowski. Sabin and Koprowski developed a live-virus vaccine which would trigger a natural infection to generate antibodies against polio. Salk created a killed-virus to stimulate the immune system to produce antibodies without an infection. Most researchers backed the live-virus vaccine.
Oshinsky detailed the rivalry between Salk and Sabin. Sabin considered Salk a “kitchen chemist” and not the intellectual equal of other polio researchers. Salk conquered Polio by creating his first vaccine in the middle 1950’s and distributing it to enough children to almost completely eradicate the disease. Sabin, however, was highly critical of it. He competed heavily to create his oral version until it took over worldwide as the vaccine to use because it was easier to disburse and it had more supporters. It was used for years until the reemergence of the Salk vaccine because the Sabin live vaccine could cause polio. It is now a disease of the past in the US and the WHO hopes to eradicate it completely worldwide. To date there are a few cases found in some African nations. Salk was never elected to the National Academy of Science although other polio researchers have been elected. However, Salk was revered by the people.
This was a well-researched narrative history of polio. It is a gripping scientific story and cultural history well deserving of the Pulitzer Prize in history.
The National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis was founded in the 1930’s by FDR and Basil O’Connor to help defeat this illness which FDR contracted in his late 30’s. The history of polio was explored in depth and with insight. The three major competitors for creating the vaccine were Dr. Jonas Salk, Dr. Albert Sabin, and Dr. Hilary Koprowski. Sabin and Koprowski developed a live-virus vaccine which would trigger a natural infection to generate antibodies against polio. Salk created a killed-virus to stimulate the immune system to produce antibodies without an infection. Most researchers backed the live-virus vaccine.
Oshinsky detailed the rivalry between Salk and Sabin. Sabin considered Salk a “kitchen chemist” and not the intellectual equal of other polio researchers. Salk conquered Polio by creating his first vaccine in the middle 1950’s and distributing it to enough children to almost completely eradicate the disease. Sabin, however, was highly critical of it. He competed heavily to create his oral version until it took over worldwide as the vaccine to use because it was easier to disburse and it had more supporters. It was used for years until the reemergence of the Salk vaccine because the Sabin live vaccine could cause polio. It is now a disease of the past in the US and the WHO hopes to eradicate it completely worldwide. To date there are a few cases found in some African nations. Salk was never elected to the National Academy of Science although other polio researchers have been elected. However, Salk was revered by the people.
This was a well-researched narrative history of polio. It is a gripping scientific story and cultural history well deserving of the Pulitzer Prize in history.
January 30, 2010
I read this Pulitzer Prize winner on the recommendation of Dan Jewett, Social Studies Chair at Manchester Essex RHS. As a polio victim myself (at age 5 in 1952), I well remember the Sister Kenny treatments (hot wool wraps on my affected legs) and the physical therapy that my mother did with me. Oshinsky was taken the story and made a drama of the race to create a vaccine. The Salk/Sabin race, the origins and strategies of the March of Dimes (which paid for all my treatment), and the controversy over how to distribute the vaccine all make for compelling reading. The book is meticulously researched and is riveting.
One saddening side note: In discussing the Eisenhower administration's inability to get the approved vaccine to the people, Oshinsky writes, "The administration's lack of planning was a conscious decision, not an unfortunate oversight. Neither the President nor his advisors viewed the distribution of the polio vaccine as a legitimate government function." In retrospect, the public interest and lives of many cried out for government action, and I could not help but think of today's health care debate, and how in the future we will find it ridiculous that we waited so long to provide health care for all.
What a wonderful piece of scholarship!
One saddening side note: In discussing the Eisenhower administration's inability to get the approved vaccine to the people, Oshinsky writes, "The administration's lack of planning was a conscious decision, not an unfortunate oversight. Neither the President nor his advisors viewed the distribution of the polio vaccine as a legitimate government function." In retrospect, the public interest and lives of many cried out for government action, and I could not help but think of today's health care debate, and how in the future we will find it ridiculous that we waited so long to provide health care for all.
What a wonderful piece of scholarship!
November 19, 2020
It is easy to appreciate that David Oshinsky’s Polio: An American Story won the Pulitzer in 2006. It is a piece of narrative history that pulled me into the story from the beginning. Oshinsky details the history of polio and the race to create a vaccine. In the early 20th century polio was an epidemic affecting children throughout the United States. When President Franklin D. Roosevelt was stricken with the disease at the age of 39, he advocated for possible cures and a vaccine. Through this advocacy, the March of Dimes was organized. Funding from the March of Dimes, private contributors and grants gave way to years of research and testing. Several pioneers would emerge with possible vaccines, with two successful contenders created by Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin, rival scientists with different approaches.
This is a very engaging story that examines the effects that polio had on American society and culture. Oshinsky details the good, bad, and ugly of research and testing utilizing monkeys, prisoners, and unlikely volunteers. Like modern-day pandemics/epidemics, life was somewhat halted until a vaccine became available and Americans could once again breathe a sigh of relief and carry on with living a normal life.
This is a very engaging story that examines the effects that polio had on American society and culture. Oshinsky details the good, bad, and ugly of research and testing utilizing monkeys, prisoners, and unlikely volunteers. Like modern-day pandemics/epidemics, life was somewhat halted until a vaccine became available and Americans could once again breathe a sigh of relief and carry on with living a normal life.
April 3, 2016
Such an interesting account of the history of the quest of a vaccine for polio. Amazing that so much was done by a private agency with volunteers and donations from the American public. Such a shame to see the petty rivals among the scientists.
August 4, 2017
Happy to learn about a disease, now conquered in this country, but that was held in such dread less than a century ago. Some highlights(Spoilers?): President Roosevelt hid his disability from the public with the help of reporters(!) It was the first time the nation came together to donate money for a health issue. Many monkeys died for the sake of the vaccine. Unethical testing was done on institutionalized children. TWO MILLION CHILDREN were part of a National TRIAL to discover the effectiveness of the vaccine. There was a movement to start socialized medicine, but pharmaceutical companies and the McCarthy scare squashed it. An informative and satisfying read.
November 16, 2018
If you feel bad about how things are going in the world these days, all one has to do is read some history to realize how much better things are now than they used to be. Like for example as long as I know we are not testing vaccines on mentally ill children in mental institutions. This book was fascinating, covering not only from a historical perspective but also discussing the political side of early vaccines with the ramifications of privilege/wealth in the US. I would definitely recommend to anyone who this sounds interesting to. It does read rather dry, but I don't ever mind that as long as I'm learning something.
January 11, 2014
Workman-like and competent, this book is Pulitzer Prize material more because of the weakness of field that year (the other 2006 nominees were New York Burning: Liberty, Slavery, and Conspiracy in Eighteenth-Century Manhattan & The Rise of American Democracy: Jefferson to Lincoln) than the impressiveness of this very uneven volume.
Oshinsky's primary interest, and his real talent as an author lies in describing the personalities that pushed the search for a cure forward and their relationships. For that reason the "American Story" of the subtitle is really a story of four primary actors: Franklin Roosevelt, Basil O'Connor, Jonas Salk, and Albert Sabin. In turn, each of these actors is presented as the public face of polio and the story of the cure is personalized through their actions. The result is that we hear about outbreaks and panics as asides to the main story, as in how the record polio year of 1952 lent support to those wanting to move Salk's vaccine to public trial. This also means that the wind down of the book is wasted space, since the climax of the story as told through these actors was the replacement of the Salk killed vaccine with Sabin's live vaccine in the 1960s. This is presented as a smooth transition that ended the contest, until the recent debates about phasing out the Sabin vaccine to bring an end the disease in the wild.
Problem one is that this four actor narrative over-simplifies the story, and reduces everything to interpersonal politics, and the rivalry of Salk and Sabin is characterized as a zero sum contest where one wins and the other loses. We lose the rich layer of paranoia that the March of Dimes inspired about the disease in an era already rich with fear. We lose the decades of research by other participants whose stories are as equally deserving of telling, and here only get a facile paragraph or so. We lose the seminal influence that the March of Dimes campaign had in establishing celebrity diseases and later searches for cures for breast cancer, drugs, AIDS, PKD, and others. We lose the cultural impact of the disease altogether except for the segment where Salk becomes a national hero.The narrowness of Oshinsky's vision is apparent in the selection of pictures included in the book. We are shown pictures of quarantines, but there is a bare mention in the text. We are shown Eddie Cantor, Richard Nixon, and Joe DiMaggio at March of Dimes events, but only Cantor gets bare notice in the text. We are shown ward after ward of sick children but we never visit them. We are shown images of mass vaccination programs, but they are just not mentioned. This is an "American story" at its most abstract.
Problem two is that anywhere these four actors are not involved Oshinsky becomes glib and unreliable. He doesn't seem very interested in why polio emerged in the early 20th century as a disease of the developed world, he first tells us that there are several hypotheses, and then only tells us of one that from then on he refers to as an established fact. He tells us of a woman who became an early hero of polio treatment through her theory that polio could be treated with heat and massage. We are never given any basis upon which we can judge the effectiveness of her treatment over others because up to that point Oshinsky didn't bother describing any treatment in detail with the one exception of how heat and massages potentially made FDR's polio damage worse. Then at the very end of the book, where he is trying to sum up the contest between Salk and Sabin we are simply told that Sabin's vaccine won in the 1960s and Salk left polio research to go found a research institute, and we are treated to long and digressive sections about the weirdness of the Salk Institute but no more detail about the ongoing discussions in the medical community that lasted throughout this period about which vaccine was more effective and the continual improvements in both vaccines. I was vaccinated against polio long after Sabin won the field in Oshinky's opinion, yet I (and all of my classmates) received the Salk killed virus. Then for a booster, I got the oral vaccine long before Oshinsky claims that the mixed approach was tried in the 2000s. This is just sloppy work that needlessly oversimplifies a complicated issue.
Problem three is that by naming this "An American Story" Oshinsky was able to ignore the global campaigns except for where it applies to his four actor narrative. So we get almost nothing about the eradication of polio in the western hemisphere, or the ongoing campaign which is getting close to eliminating the disease altogether (which was a stated goal already in 2005), but we do get detailed observations of Sabin's vaccine trials in Russia.
In short, because I feel that the personal rivalry of Salk and Sabin is the least interesting part of the history of polio, I consider this a very bad history. What it really is best considered as is four person biography. So two stars.
Oshinsky's primary interest, and his real talent as an author lies in describing the personalities that pushed the search for a cure forward and their relationships. For that reason the "American Story" of the subtitle is really a story of four primary actors: Franklin Roosevelt, Basil O'Connor, Jonas Salk, and Albert Sabin. In turn, each of these actors is presented as the public face of polio and the story of the cure is personalized through their actions. The result is that we hear about outbreaks and panics as asides to the main story, as in how the record polio year of 1952 lent support to those wanting to move Salk's vaccine to public trial. This also means that the wind down of the book is wasted space, since the climax of the story as told through these actors was the replacement of the Salk killed vaccine with Sabin's live vaccine in the 1960s. This is presented as a smooth transition that ended the contest, until the recent debates about phasing out the Sabin vaccine to bring an end the disease in the wild.
Problem one is that this four actor narrative over-simplifies the story, and reduces everything to interpersonal politics, and the rivalry of Salk and Sabin is characterized as a zero sum contest where one wins and the other loses. We lose the rich layer of paranoia that the March of Dimes inspired about the disease in an era already rich with fear. We lose the decades of research by other participants whose stories are as equally deserving of telling, and here only get a facile paragraph or so. We lose the seminal influence that the March of Dimes campaign had in establishing celebrity diseases and later searches for cures for breast cancer, drugs, AIDS, PKD, and others. We lose the cultural impact of the disease altogether except for the segment where Salk becomes a national hero.The narrowness of Oshinsky's vision is apparent in the selection of pictures included in the book. We are shown pictures of quarantines, but there is a bare mention in the text. We are shown Eddie Cantor, Richard Nixon, and Joe DiMaggio at March of Dimes events, but only Cantor gets bare notice in the text. We are shown ward after ward of sick children but we never visit them. We are shown images of mass vaccination programs, but they are just not mentioned. This is an "American story" at its most abstract.
Problem two is that anywhere these four actors are not involved Oshinsky becomes glib and unreliable. He doesn't seem very interested in why polio emerged in the early 20th century as a disease of the developed world, he first tells us that there are several hypotheses, and then only tells us of one that from then on he refers to as an established fact. He tells us of a woman who became an early hero of polio treatment through her theory that polio could be treated with heat and massage. We are never given any basis upon which we can judge the effectiveness of her treatment over others because up to that point Oshinsky didn't bother describing any treatment in detail with the one exception of how heat and massages potentially made FDR's polio damage worse. Then at the very end of the book, where he is trying to sum up the contest between Salk and Sabin we are simply told that Sabin's vaccine won in the 1960s and Salk left polio research to go found a research institute, and we are treated to long and digressive sections about the weirdness of the Salk Institute but no more detail about the ongoing discussions in the medical community that lasted throughout this period about which vaccine was more effective and the continual improvements in both vaccines. I was vaccinated against polio long after Sabin won the field in Oshinky's opinion, yet I (and all of my classmates) received the Salk killed virus. Then for a booster, I got the oral vaccine long before Oshinsky claims that the mixed approach was tried in the 2000s. This is just sloppy work that needlessly oversimplifies a complicated issue.
Problem three is that by naming this "An American Story" Oshinsky was able to ignore the global campaigns except for where it applies to his four actor narrative. So we get almost nothing about the eradication of polio in the western hemisphere, or the ongoing campaign which is getting close to eliminating the disease altogether (which was a stated goal already in 2005), but we do get detailed observations of Sabin's vaccine trials in Russia.
In short, because I feel that the personal rivalry of Salk and Sabin is the least interesting part of the history of polio, I consider this a very bad history. What it really is best considered as is four person biography. So two stars.
dnffed
May 6, 2025Got about a third of the way through the book and had no interest in picking it up and reading on. Realizing I still had hours to go filled me with such dismay that I knew it was time to put it aside. It was contributing to a serious reading slump. I enjoyed reading about FDR and the March of Dimes but overall it just was a flat and uninteresting read for me.
July 30, 2017
I remember my mother saying the reason that she never learned to swim as a child was because of the fear of polio. I am not old enough to remember the braces on childrens legs or the iron lung so after reading David M. Oshinsky's Bellevue: Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America's Most Storied Hospital, which I found to be exceedingly well written, I decided to try this book. Polio: An American Story turned out to be just as well written. The author takes us in to the time where polio was dominate, where heartbrake came every summer and for the families where the (mainly children) loved ones lived, the heartbrake prevailed. The histories of Salk and Sabin and the rush to find a vaccine were very interestingly told and I could feel the hope of the millions who were worried about this disease and their families...
I very much recommend this book.
I very much recommend this book.
June 4, 2021
Does a good job tracking the fight against polio, from the creation of the March of Dimes to FDR to O'Connor to the development of the Salk and Sabin vaccines. You learn of the many scientists and non-scientists involved in the struggle, but what this book doesn't do is a good job of putting a human face on the participants in the struggle. Too often they might as well be automatons. There is one other problem: the author asks four questions about polio in the introduction, the implication being the reader will learn the answers reading the book. The reader does not, nor does the author explain why not.
May 6, 2019
More like 3.5. Very interesting but it wasn't earth shattering. Also I am a tough reviewer before coffee.
Most important takeaway--VACCINATION SAVES LIVES!
Most important takeaway--VACCINATION SAVES LIVES!
August 28, 2013
A great turn of events surrounding post WWII. The advancements in cleanliness with the sprawling of the suburbs brought about an awakening of a common disease that usually young children are exposed to and built immunity against quickly. Boys were especially hit hard and class distinction played a part where the middle class was more susceptible. War brought with it field studies involving vaccinations for flu and yellow fever so fighting polio would have a laid out plan to follow.
Polio was ready to be dealt with and players such as Salk, Sabin, Francis, Koprowski etc. came along. The president at the time, Roosevelt, also contracted the virus and no doubt him being affected created a national urgency around this particular case. Polio came quickly in the summer time where exhaustion and heat seemed to play a role. A national foundation for infantile paralysis (NFIP) was set up and a man named O'Connor played the role of marketing, founding, and research distribution. The March of Dimes was an idea that the foundation used to generate income for the sick, survivors, and future research.
The next step was the vaccine for which Salk used a dead strain, and Sabin used a live strain. There was back and forth debate about which one was more effective. The Salk vaccine of 1954 brought about the first mass inoculations. The vaccine itself was produced by independent companies such as Elly Lilly and others. The Cutter fiasco unfortunately turned the independent free-market distribution on its head and thus need for governmental oversight. The American Medical Association (AMA) was also set up around this time (1955) to try to combat purely corporatist involvement.
Sabin's vaccine would overtake Salk's, and field trials in Moscow showed to be workable. Till the end Sabin and Salk were in a race and both believed their own versions of the vaccine to be superior. Polio was really the top fundraising disease at the time with cancer being third. It brought about the concept of fund raising on a massive scale that we see today as well as superstar scientists like Salk.
Polio was ready to be dealt with and players such as Salk, Sabin, Francis, Koprowski etc. came along. The president at the time, Roosevelt, also contracted the virus and no doubt him being affected created a national urgency around this particular case. Polio came quickly in the summer time where exhaustion and heat seemed to play a role. A national foundation for infantile paralysis (NFIP) was set up and a man named O'Connor played the role of marketing, founding, and research distribution. The March of Dimes was an idea that the foundation used to generate income for the sick, survivors, and future research.
The next step was the vaccine for which Salk used a dead strain, and Sabin used a live strain. There was back and forth debate about which one was more effective. The Salk vaccine of 1954 brought about the first mass inoculations. The vaccine itself was produced by independent companies such as Elly Lilly and others. The Cutter fiasco unfortunately turned the independent free-market distribution on its head and thus need for governmental oversight. The American Medical Association (AMA) was also set up around this time (1955) to try to combat purely corporatist involvement.
Sabin's vaccine would overtake Salk's, and field trials in Moscow showed to be workable. Till the end Sabin and Salk were in a race and both believed their own versions of the vaccine to be superior. Polio was really the top fundraising disease at the time with cancer being third. It brought about the concept of fund raising on a massive scale that we see today as well as superstar scientists like Salk.
April 4, 2019
This book won a Pulitzer in 2006 and after reading, believe the award was quite justified. Interesting stuff!
There was a brief history of Polio provided at the beginning, but there real focus of this book began in chapter two, when FDR became infected. There’s a great deal of information about the creation and mobilization of the March of Dimes and its epic successes through the years. Polio was definitely the hardest fought disease of the last century. That said, there’s a chart on page 239 that really put it into a strange perspective for me. It shows the Agency, the amount of money it raised, and the number of cases in 1954. The National Association for Infantile Paralysis raised almost 70 million dollars that year and there were 100,000 cases. By comparison, the American Heart Association raised a measly 11.3 million dollars that year, while there were 10 million heart cases. Speaks volumes to the power of marketing and the fear of this disease in the heart of the American public.
The Salk-Sabin conflict was well covered and left me just appalled at the size of their egos. Pathetic pathetic pathetic. Reminded me of all the conflict between virologists during the early days of the AIDS epidemic. Boggles the mind to wonder what would happen if they all worked together for the greater good instead of actively against each other...sigh...
In any case, very interesting book, definitely recommend!
There was a brief history of Polio provided at the beginning, but there real focus of this book began in chapter two, when FDR became infected. There’s a great deal of information about the creation and mobilization of the March of Dimes and its epic successes through the years. Polio was definitely the hardest fought disease of the last century. That said, there’s a chart on page 239 that really put it into a strange perspective for me. It shows the Agency, the amount of money it raised, and the number of cases in 1954. The National Association for Infantile Paralysis raised almost 70 million dollars that year and there were 100,000 cases. By comparison, the American Heart Association raised a measly 11.3 million dollars that year, while there were 10 million heart cases. Speaks volumes to the power of marketing and the fear of this disease in the heart of the American public.
The Salk-Sabin conflict was well covered and left me just appalled at the size of their egos. Pathetic pathetic pathetic. Reminded me of all the conflict between virologists during the early days of the AIDS epidemic. Boggles the mind to wonder what would happen if they all worked together for the greater good instead of actively against each other...sigh...
In any case, very interesting book, definitely recommend!
June 15, 2016
Long but intriguing history of a medical mystery. There's lots about science in here, of course, but there's also politics, technology, persuasion, and international relations. Oshinsky provides mini-biographies of FDR, Salk, Sabin, and many others.
I didn't know that the March of Dimes name was a pun on the March of Time, a popular newsreel back in the day. I didn't realize that Canada treated polio as a public health emergency and planned for months to distribute polio vaccine as soon as it was available, while the United States at first tried to treat it as a matter for private companies and individual doctors. There was such an outcry that the Eisenhower administration changed its mind and cabinet member Oveta Culp Hobby was eventually hounded to resign over it. (She didn't help her case when she said publicly that nobody could have predicted such demand for polio vaccine . . . this at a time when polio epidemics killed thousands each summer.)
Very sad to read about Isabel Morgan, a superstar polio researcher who was underpaid and underappreciated. She retired midcareer to become a wife and stepmother and to do other, less crucial research near her husband's job. Makes you wonder how much talent America has allowed to wither because the person in question was the wrong gender or race or religion or wasn't rich.
Inspiring to find out about the remaining polio survivors, who on average have more education and higher earnings than their peers. They realized that they would have to work harder than others just to break even . . . and sometimes not even that.
I didn't know that the March of Dimes name was a pun on the March of Time, a popular newsreel back in the day. I didn't realize that Canada treated polio as a public health emergency and planned for months to distribute polio vaccine as soon as it was available, while the United States at first tried to treat it as a matter for private companies and individual doctors. There was such an outcry that the Eisenhower administration changed its mind and cabinet member Oveta Culp Hobby was eventually hounded to resign over it. (She didn't help her case when she said publicly that nobody could have predicted such demand for polio vaccine . . . this at a time when polio epidemics killed thousands each summer.)
Very sad to read about Isabel Morgan, a superstar polio researcher who was underpaid and underappreciated. She retired midcareer to become a wife and stepmother and to do other, less crucial research near her husband's job. Makes you wonder how much talent America has allowed to wither because the person in question was the wrong gender or race or religion or wasn't rich.
Inspiring to find out about the remaining polio survivors, who on average have more education and higher earnings than their peers. They realized that they would have to work harder than others just to break even . . . and sometimes not even that.
December 23, 2010
I have a masochistic streak which drives me to read the opinions of pundits. As a result, I am subjected to a lot of gaseous carping by soreheads about how bad everything has come to be. Yearning for the good old days yourself? Consider this scenario:
Day 1: Everything fine -- a beautiful summer day.
Day 2: After a day of exercise, you have a stiff neck and are very tired.
Day 3: You have polio -- you're in agony.
Day 4 until the end of your life: You are a helpless cripple in an iron lung, bankrupting your family.
Happy that this is no longer something to worry about? Me too! This improvement in the standard of living is not attributable to the miracle of free market forces, nor was it the result of some benevolent government program. Instead, far-flung group of individuals (mostly scientists, but also fundraisers), working independently but each seemingly driven by a combination of altruism and egomania, decided to devote the talents they had been blessed with to the elimination of the disease. Step by tiny step, with some steps backwards, over a period of years, they succeeded, in spite of (and sometimes because of) fighting ferociously with each other.
This book is not for people who need their heroes endless admirable, but I give it the highest word of praise I can give a book, one I always search for in reviews: “readable”.
P.S. I also learned what "adjuvant" means.
Day 1: Everything fine -- a beautiful summer day.
Day 2: After a day of exercise, you have a stiff neck and are very tired.
Day 3: You have polio -- you're in agony.
Day 4 until the end of your life: You are a helpless cripple in an iron lung, bankrupting your family.
Happy that this is no longer something to worry about? Me too! This improvement in the standard of living is not attributable to the miracle of free market forces, nor was it the result of some benevolent government program. Instead, far-flung group of individuals (mostly scientists, but also fundraisers), working independently but each seemingly driven by a combination of altruism and egomania, decided to devote the talents they had been blessed with to the elimination of the disease. Step by tiny step, with some steps backwards, over a period of years, they succeeded, in spite of (and sometimes because of) fighting ferociously with each other.
This book is not for people who need their heroes endless admirable, but I give it the highest word of praise I can give a book, one I always search for in reviews: “readable”.
P.S. I also learned what "adjuvant" means.
June 19, 2018
I read this book in part because one of my friends was diagnosed with post polio syndrome in her late forties, and in part, to understand polio better and how the the vaccine was developed.
This sprawling epic proved to be a good choice. It takes readers on a journey from the earliest fraught days of scientific research through to the issues we face today, as polio and other preventable diseases are making comebacks among populations that have no experience with the disease and mistrust science to provide prevention.
We meet and come to know and understand the leading researchers behind the Salk and live vaccines developed in the 1950s, informed by years of work and at times fractious competition between labs. Controversy and conflict drive outcomes as much as collaboration.
The author weaves the polio story together with broader themes around the funding of research, the political and sociocultural factors that have shaped health care more generally in the USA.
A fascinating read.
This sprawling epic proved to be a good choice. It takes readers on a journey from the earliest fraught days of scientific research through to the issues we face today, as polio and other preventable diseases are making comebacks among populations that have no experience with the disease and mistrust science to provide prevention.
We meet and come to know and understand the leading researchers behind the Salk and live vaccines developed in the 1950s, informed by years of work and at times fractious competition between labs. Controversy and conflict drive outcomes as much as collaboration.
The author weaves the polio story together with broader themes around the funding of research, the political and sociocultural factors that have shaped health care more generally in the USA.
A fascinating read.
March 27, 2013
Excellent account of the history of the campaign against polio in the US. Perhaps my experience as a polio survivor influences my reaction to the book. However, this is the first book that has made me want to know more about this terrible disease. I would have liked to have read even more about the social history of reactions to polio. I think a lot of reviewers are too young to understand how the threat of polio really paralyzed our society and distorted childhood experiences for many.
August 19, 2011
Pulitzer Prize for History 2006. I don't often read non-fiction. Oshinsky elightens the social, economic and medical climates for polio. He depicts the terror and frustration associated with this mysterious virus.
1952, the year I contracted polio, was "the worst polio year on record, with more than 57,000 cases nationwide."
I feel very fortunate. I have some paralysis and post-polio syndrome, but I'm still here.
1952, the year I contracted polio, was "the worst polio year on record, with more than 57,000 cases nationwide."
I feel very fortunate. I have some paralysis and post-polio syndrome, but I'm still here.
August 1, 2018
The history of polio in America is a long sprawling tale, which includes a president, a wildly successful fundraising organization, baby boomer epidemics, 1950s suburban terror, iron lungs (!), and the first celebrity scientist. And let’s throw in some high stakes scientific rivalries while we are at it.
This is typically my favorite type of non fiction book, but I have discovered I enjoy books with a little more focus. This one had to be sprawling.
This is typically my favorite type of non fiction book, but I have discovered I enjoy books with a little more focus. This one had to be sprawling.
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