Do You Remember Polio? - Page 5

sharlee · ‎03-09-2010

Yes, I remember when the Sabin (oral) vaccine was introduced in our community in 1961, and we three kids and our mom and dad all went down to the elementary school to receive it.

My brothers and I had already been vaccinated with the Salk (injectable) vaccine, but we got the oral kind as well. I think nearly all parents of that era were alike in that they wouldn't think of leaving a vaccination undone - they could all remember the terrible effects of those diseases.

Pretty sure I got smallpox vaccine, too, around 5 years of age - I can still see my scar, although it's faint.

"Behold! We are not bound forever to the circles of the world, and beyond them is more than memory." J.R.R. Tolkien

shoekitty · ‎03-10-2010

@Still Raining wrote:
I remember it well, it was like a dark cloud. There were a lot of pictures of little kids in iron lungs and a lot of fear of swimming pools. When the sugar cube vaccine came out I remember lining up on the weekend in front of the elementry school and having the little cups given to you when you got up to the table. Am I right in remembering that adults took it too?

Shoe kitty said

Yes, you remember right. Adults took it. There was a line a couple blocks long at the local high school to receive the sugar cube vaccine. Adults at that time had not had the vaccination. Polio attacked any age group. I know 2 adults who got it in the 1950's. It started with a blinding headache, pounding, then the fever. In 1961 I was 13. I think besides a TB test the only vaccination I had was for smallpox. I remember that because it got infected, and I had a reaction and it left a scar the size of a nickel.
I remember moms talking about exposing their daughters to measles so they would get it as a child instead of an adult. Coming down with measles was a fear among pregnant women.. It meant birth defects, or miscarriage usually. When the Rubella vaccine came out it was widly cheered!

“sometimes you have to bite your upper lip and put sunglasses on”….Bob Dylan

151949 · ‎03-09-2010

Yes, I remember my Mom taking me over to play with my cousin who had german measles so I would get them while I was a child. It was very important for little girls to get measles and chicken pox as a child because they both would cause birth defects or miscarriage in a pregnant woman.

Lindsays Grandma · ‎03-10-2010

That was a very fearful time. I remember so vividly when a neighbor's little boy was sick, running a temperature and how all of us mothers were praying it wasn't polio. We were so worried about the boy and also about our children who had been playing with him. It was a blessing when the vaccine was available.

The moving finger writes; And having writ, Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line Nor all your Tears Wash out a Word of it. Omar Khayam

Vamp · ‎04-14-2010

I was born in 1960, so I had the vaccine as did all of my contemporaries. So, no, I did not know anyone who had polio; however, I knew a couple of adults who walked with a limp or had a leg brace as the result of polio. Why anyone would choose not to vaccinate their children is puzzling to me.

onewhiteSparrow · ‎08-05-2011

I remember eating a pink sugar cube as a child. I never saw any sign of polio where I lived. Never saw anyone with any sign of ever having polio in their past.

Staying out of the water... because people thought they could get polio... I never heard anyone talk about such a thing.

Because we went water skiing every day of the year...yes, even when it was raining. My Father said we were going to get wet anyways...so we might as well have fun skiing.

sfnative · ‎03-10-2010

I had 2 cousins in the same family who contracted polio in 1950. One required the iron lung. She had one badly damaged leg which requqired a full length brace her entire life and the other leg a brace up to the knee and walked with crutches, later using an electric cart. She became an intellectually strong woman and eventually accepted a position in her state on the board which addresses the requirements of the physically challenged. We lost her at age 45 to a heart attack. She had much to do yet in her life.

When the Sabin vaccine was first available, I was very young and recall my mother dressing me up in my Sunday best for a bus ride downtown to the Department of Public Health by City Hall in S.F. to stand in line on the first day that shots were available. I was not taken out of school, so this must have been prior to 1952.

Lucky Charm · ‎03-09-2010

@Tissyanne wrote:
I am very happy for Amy, Steve, and Bree. Adorable host, and I wish her all the best.

@Tissyanne That's really strange that you were replying to another thread, but it showed up on this old one!

Bizzare!!

ETA: Obviously you were replying to the Amy Stran thread and that's shows as the title, but somehow it 'attached' itself to an old Polio thread.

lulu2 · ‎03-09-2010

I was born in 1950 and remember how afraid I was I'd contract polio. There was a boy on our street who had it. I remember being scared of the iron long.

I remember painful polio shots. My father was family doctor; his office was in our house. I remember hearing children screaming when they were given their shots. (at the end of the visit they were given a lollipop with a shovel, a rake, or a hoe on one end)

I remember getting the sugar cubes when I was in high school.

Now they say the polio virus may help combat cancer.