Postgraduate Research And Early Laboratory Work
In 1941, during his postgraduate work in virology, Salk chose a two-month elective to work in the Thomas Francis‘ laboratory at the University of Michigan. Francis had recently joined the faculty of the medical school after working for the Rockefeller Foundation, where he had discovered the type B influenza virus. According to Bookchin, “the two-month stint in Francis’s lab was Salk’s first introduction to the world of virologyand he was hooked.”:25 After graduating from medical school, Salk began his residency at New York’s prestigious Mount Sinai Hospital, where he again worked in Francis’s laboratory. Salk then worked at the University of Michigan School of Public Health with Francis, on an army-commissioned project in Michigan to develop an influenza vaccine. He and Francis eventually perfected a vaccine that was soon widely used at army bases, where Salk discovered and isolated one of the strains of influenza that was included in the final vaccine.:26
Extensive publicity and fear of polio led to much increased funding, $67 million by 1955, but research continued on dangerous live vaccines.:8587Salk decided to use the safer ‘killed’ virus, instead of weakened forms of strains of polio viruses like the ones used contemporaneously by Albert Sabin, who was developing an oral vaccine.
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Why Cdc Is Involved
While the global push to eradicate polio is the latest chapter in CDCs polio efforts, the fight against polio has been part of CDCs mission since the 1950s. Shortly after the agencys creation, CDC established a national polio surveillance unit headed by CDCs Epidemic Intelligence Service founder Alex Langmuir. CDC worked collaboratively with Dr. Jonas Salk, of the University of Pittsburgh, who developed the inactivated polio vaccine in the early 1950s, and Dr. Albert Sabin, who developed the oral polio vaccine in the early 1960s. CDCs PSU staff and EIS officers worked to administer both the Salk and Sabin polio vaccines in the field, and also gather and analyze surveillance data.
Development Of The Salk Vaccine
Researchers began working on a polio vaccine in the 1930s, but early attempts were unsuccessful. An effective vaccine didn’t come around until 1953, when Jonas Salk introduced his inactivated polio vaccine .
Salk had studied viruses as a student at New York University in the 1930s and helped develop flu vaccines during World War II, according to History.com. In 1948, he was awarded a research grant from President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, later named . Roosevelt had contracted polio in 1921 at age 39, and the disease left him with both legs permanently paralyzed. In 1938, five years into his presidency, Roosevelt helped to create the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis to raise money and deliver aid to areas experiencing polio epidemics.
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Salk’s vaccine was unusual because instead of using a weakened version of the live virus, such as what is used for mumps and measles, Salk’s vaccine used a “killed,” or inactivated, version of the virus. When the “dead” poliovirus is injected into the bloodstream, it can’t cause an infection because the virus is inactive but the immune system can’t distinguish an activated virus from an inactivated one, and it creates antibodies to fight the virus. Those antibodies persist and protect the person from future poliovirus infection.
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Polio Vaccine History: Timeline Of Poliomyelitis Discovery And Vaccine Invention
Polio is a serious viral infection that was globally prevalent before the 1980s. Thankfully, its groundbreaking vaccine essentially eradicated it in most parts of the world. Join Flo as we explore the history of polio as well as the scientists who discovered the polio vaccine.
History Of Polio Vaccination
Correspondence to: Anda Baicus, MD, PhD, Lecturer in Microbiology, Head of the National Polio Laboratory, National Institute of Research and Development for Microbiology and Immunology Cantacuzino, University of Medicine and Pharmacy Carol Davila, 050096 Bucharest, Romania.
Telephone: +40-740-213102 Fax: +40-215-287305
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The Virus Research Laboratory And Poliovirus
In 1947 Salk accepted a position at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine to establish a Virus Research Laboratory. He devoted his efforts to creating a first-class research environment and to publishing scientific papers on a variety of topics, including poliovirus. His work drew the attention of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis , and he was invited to participate in a research program sponsored by the foundation. He agreed and took up his assignment of typing polioviruses.
Jonas Salk Inventor Of The Polio Vaccine Could You Patent The Sun
Its a topical question during this COVID-19 pandemic: why are the companies that developed the vaccines against the coronavirus not giving away their patent on the vaccines for the greater good? Why arent governments forcing pharmaceutical companies to license other companies to share their patented invention under a compulsory license arrangement?
To support that idea, people like to bring to memory the history of the invention of the vaccine against polio. Heard of Jonas Salk or Albert Sabin? Jonas Salk became a hero when he invented the vaccine against polio, a worldwide disease affecting young children, paralyzing between 20,000 and 50,000 children annually. Although it was the first polio vaccine, it was not to be the last, as Albert Sabin introduced an oral vaccine in the 1960s that replaced Salks.
Because Salks vaccine was being used successfully in the United States, Sabin could not get support for a large-scale, controlled field trial like the trial of Salks vaccine. In 1957, Sabin convinced the Soviet Unions Health Ministry to conduct field studies with his vaccine. After the Soviet trial succeeded in 1960, the U.S. Public Health Service approved the vaccine in 1961 for manufacture in the United States, and the World Health Organization used a live-virus vaccine produced in the USSR.
Why did Salk not patent his invention?
We cite an article by SLATE from 2014:
Further reading:
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Early Life And Education
Jonas Salk was born in New York City to Daniel and Dora Salk. His parents were Ashkenazi Jewish Daniel was born in New Jersey to immigrant parents and Dora, who was born in Minsk, emigrated when she was twelve. Salk’s parents did not receive extensive formal education. Jonas had two younger brothers, Herman and Lee, a renowned child psychologist. The family moved from East Harlem to 853 Elsmere Place, the Bronx, with some time spent in Queens at 439 Beach 69th Street, Arverne.
When he was 13, Salk entered Townsend Harris High School, a public school for intellectually gifted students. Named after the founder of City College of New York , it was, wrote his biographer, Dr. David Oshinsky, “a launching pad for the talented sons of immigrant parents who lacked the moneyand pedigreeto attend a top private school.” In high school “he was known as a perfectionist … who read everything he could lay his hands on,” according to one of his fellow students. Students had to cram a four-year curriculum into just three years. As a result, most dropped out or flunked out, despite the school’s motto “study, study, study.” Of the students who graduated, however, most had the grades to enroll in CCNY, noted for being a highly competitive college.:96
Personal Life And Legacy
While in college in New York, Salk met his first wife, Donna Lindsay, whom he married in 1939. Together they had three children, Peter, Darrell and Jonathan, who ultimately pursued their own medical and research careers. In 1965, Jonas Salk moved to La Jolla, California, and founded the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, which remains one of his most enduring legacies. The institute was established to provide an environment of creativity where researchers could work together to explore the wider implications of their discoveries for the future of humanity. Many talented scientists were attracted to La Jolla, with the institutes first faculty consisting of the likes of Dr Francis Crick, the co-discoverer of the DNA double helix.
In 1968, Salks first marriage ended in divorce. Shortly thereafter, he met the French artist Françoise Gilot, a former mistress of Pablo Picasso, and they were married in 1970. He found a rare combination of artistry, intellect and companionship in Gilot, and remained in La Jolla with his new wife for the remainder of his career until his death from heart failure in 1995. An interviewer once inquired about the ownership of the polio vaccine patent, to which Salk famously answered, Well, the people, I would say. There is no patent. Could you patent the sun? It was this spirit of humanism in combination with his astounding accomplishments in virology and vaccine development that have permanently etched Salk into the annals of medical history.
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How Was The Polio Vaccine Developed
In todays world, the poliovirus circulates in just three countries Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nigeria, plus a risk for the return of polio in Papua New Guinea.
That wasnt always the case. In the last century alone polio plagued the United States.
But, the entire history of polio dates back long before there was any recorded history. It wasnt until British physician, Michael Underwood, provided the first clinical description of the disease in 1789 that the world recognized polio as a detrimental problem.
Development Of The Polio Vaccine
Dr John Enders and his colleaguesANCHOR in the 1940s showed that polio virus could be grown in human tissue, and this breakthrough was rightly awarded the Nobel Prize in 1954. Even in the 1940s, the virus was too small to be seen with any available technique, so there was only one way that Dr Enders could check that he had in fact extracted the virus from mouse brain tissue and grown it in culture. This was by injecting the culture fluid into mice and monkeys, where it produced paralysis typical of polio.About 40 years of research using monkeys, rats and mice led directly to the introduction of the Salk and Sabin polio vaccines in the 1950s. Professor Albert Sabin’s 1956 paper in the Journal of the American Medical Association stated:ANCHOR”approximately 9,000 monkeys, 150 chimpanzees and 133 human volunteers have been used thus far in the quantitative studies of various characteristics of different strains of polio virus. were necessary to solve many problems before an oral polio vaccine could become a reality.”
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Lessons From How The Polio Vaccine Went From The Lab To The Public That Americans Can Learn From Today
In 1955, after a field trial involving 1.8 million Americans, the worlds first successful polio vaccine was declared safe, effective, and potent.
It was arguably the most significant biomedical advance of the past century. Despite the polio vaccines long-term success, manufacturers, government leaders and the nonprofit that funded the vaccines development made several missteps.
Having produced a documentary about the polio vaccines field trials, we believe the lessons learned during that chapter in medical history are worth considering as the race to develop COVID-19 vaccines proceeds.
Polio Vaccine Introduced In Australia
1956: Introduction of polio vaccine ends epidemic in Australia
Polio was among the most frightening diseases to affect Australians during the 20th century.
The incurable and unpredictable viral disease mostly targeted children and could cause permanent paralysis, even death. It sometimes reached epidemic proportions across the world.
It wasnt until the 1950s and 1960s that two Americans, Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin, separately developed effective vaccines.
Gillian Thomas, who caught polio as a baby in 1954:
They put me into a horrible-looking brace called a Thomas Brace where you just laid spreadeagled and they tied your legs and arms all the bits that were paralysed in fact, all got tied in, because all of me except a bit of one arm was paralysed. I don’t remember anything about it, because I was so young, but when I look at the picture now, I think what a horrible thing to do to a child.
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Why Do We Use The Polio Shot And Not The Oral Polio Vaccine
In about 1 of every 2.4 million recipients, the live, weakened virus contained in the oral polio vaccine causes paralysis. The shot does not have this same side effect because, unlike the oral version, the shot contains killed virus that cannot replicate and, therefore, cannot cause paralysis.
Between 1961 and 1996, children in the United States received four doses of the oral vaccine. This changed beginning in 1997 and continued throughout 1999 when children typically received two doses of the shot followed by two doses of the oral vaccine. Since that time, infants have received four doses of the shot.
Many other countries continue to use the oral polio vaccine because it is more economical and easier to administer, allowing more people to get the vaccine. It also provides better community immunity.
Vaccine Development In The 1980s Hepatitis B And Haemophilus Influenzae Type B
The vaccine for Haemophilus influenzae type b was licensed in 1985 and placed on the recommended schedule in 1989. When the schedule was published again in 1994, the hepatitis B vaccine had been added.
The hepatitis B vaccine was not new, as it had been licensed in 1981 and recommended for high-risk groups such as infants whose mothers were hepatitis B surface antigen positive, healthcare workers, intravenous drug users, homosexual men and people with multiple sexual partners. However, immunization of these groups didn’t effectively stop transmission of hepatitis B virus. Thats because about one-third of patients with acute disease were not in identifiable risk groups. The change of recommendation to immunize all infants in 1991 was the result of these failed attempts to control hepatitis B by only immunizing high-risk groups. Following this recommendation, hepatitis B disease was virtually eliminated in children less than 18 years of age in the United States.
1985 – 1994 | Recommended Vaccines
* Given in combination as DTP** Given in combination as MMR
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Children Receive First Polio Vaccine
On February 23, 1954, a group of children from Arsenal Elementary School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, receive the first injections of the new polio vaccine developed by Dr. Jonas Salk. Thanks to the vaccine, by the 21st century polio cases were reduced by 99 percent worldwide.
Though not as devastating as the plague or influenza, poliomyelitis was a highly contagious disease that emerged in terrifying outbreaks and seemed impossible to stop. Attacking the nerve cells and sometimes the central nervous system, polio caused muscle deterioration, paralysis and even death. Even as medicine vastly improved in the first half of the 20th century in the Western world, polio still struck, affecting mostly children but sometimes adults as well. The most famous victim of a 1921 outbreak in America was future President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, then a young politician. The disease spread quickly, leaving his legs permanently paralyzed.
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After mass inoculations began in 1954, everyone marveled at the high success ratesome 60-70 percentuntil the vaccine caused a sudden outbreak of some 200 cases. After it was determined that the cases were all caused by one faulty batch of the vaccine, production standards were improved, and by August 1955 some 4 million shots had been given. Cases of polio in the U.S. dropped from 14,647 in 1955 to 5,894 in 1956, and by 1959 some 90 other countries were using Salks vaccine.
A Dread Disease Strikes At Random
Each June in America, like clockwork, came newspaper photos of jam-packed polio wards and eerily deserted beaches. Newspapers ran tallies of the victimsage, sex, type of paralysisakin to baseball box scores. Children were warned not to jump into puddles or share a friends ice cream cone. Parents checked for every known symptom: a sore throat, a fever, the chills, nausea, an aching limb. Some gave their children a daily polio test. Did the neck swivel? Did the toes wiggle? Could the chin reach the chest?
In truth, polio was never the raging epidemic portrayed by the media, not even at its height in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Ten times as many children would be killed in accidents in these years, and three times as many would die of cancer. What had changed following World War II was the incidence of polio in the United States as well as the rising age of the victims, a quarter of whom were now older than 10. From 1940 to 1944, reported polio cases doubled to eight per 100,000, doubled again to 16 per 100,000 between 1945 and 1949, and climbed to 25 per 100,000 from 1950 to 1954, before peaking at 37 per 100,000 in 1952. The United States had never experienced a higher crest of the epidemiological wave, a journalist noted of the 57,000 reported cases that year, and never would again.
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Success And Polio Eradication
In the late 1950s Sabin entered into an agreement with the pharmaceutical company Pfizer to produce his live-virus vaccine. He presented Pfizer with the master strains of the virus, and the company began to perfect its production technique in its British facilities.
Sabins live-virus, oral polio vaccine soon replaced Salks killed-virus, injectable vaccine in many parts of the world. In 1994 the WHO declared that naturally occurring poliovirus had been eradicated from the Western Hemisphere owing to repeated mass immunization campaigns with the Sabin vaccine in Central and South America. The only occurrences of paralytic poliomyelitis in the West after this time were the few cases caused by the live-virus vaccine itself.