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Polio/Infantile Paralysis: experiences before the 1950s vaccine

Polio was a seriously feared disease before the 1950s. This page gives first-hand recollections of it paralysing legs, arms and lungs, and permanently stunting growth. It was not known how it spread, and there was no cure. Treatment was an iron lung to do the breathing for the patient and callipers for stretching patients' legs. Fortunately, a vaccine was developed in the 1950s, and scientists now know how the disease spreads.

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By the webmaster, based childhood observations and additional research

Polio: the dreaded childhood illness

Childhood illnesses like measles, whooping cough, mumps, chicken pox and rubella (known to us as German measles) were common when I was growing up in the 1940s. Children caught them, were ill for a while, invariably recovered and accordingly developed immunity.

There was, though, one childhood disease which was rife in my childhood and which I am extremely grateful I didn't get. Its official name was Polio and it was greatly feared.

What is Polio?

Polio was - and still is - a virus disease which could paralyse muscles, preventing or retarding their growth and function, often stunting limbs for life. It could also kill, and there was no cure. It struck indiscriminately in the summer months and mainly targeted children. It was therefore generally known as Infantile Paralysis. I only learnt much later that its official name was Polio.

How is Polio spread?

In my 1940s childhood, no one knew where Polio came from or how it was caught, although public swimming baths were widely suspected and feared by parents.

As I write now, in the 21st Century, more is known about how Polio spreads. It spreads from person to person through faeces. In other words, through the poor personal hygiene of someone infected, who may spread it on food, in drink or contact, and it is highly infectious. The infected person may spread the disease for up to six weeks even if no symptoms are present.

It is now easy to understand how an infected person with poor hygiene, going into a swimming pool after visiting the lavatory, could pass the virus on to other swimmers through contact with the infected water.

According to Wikipedia, Polio only occurs naturally in humans.

Polio affecting legs - the callipers treatment

When I started school in 1944 at the age of five, I was struck by a little girl in my class who pulled around a heavy metal contraption on one leg. This was called a calliper. She had apparently had Polio as a toddler and needed the calliper to stretch her leg so that it would lengthen to match the other leg as she grew.

A boy recovering from Polio with callipers on his legs

The best way to describe callipers is through the photo of the boy in the wheelchair who is wearing them on both legs. When he stood up, he would probably have needed crutches.

My father-in-law had Polio as a child sometime around 1915. I wish I had asked him about it, but I didn't. How often has that been said of relatives no longer with us! What I did know was that the Polio had left him with one leg shorter and thinner than the other which made him walk with a limp. At least he wasn't paralysed as he so easily could have been.

Callipers must have been childhood treatments, as I never saw an adult wearing one, presumably because they were no longer growing and couldn't therefore get stunted.

Polio affecting arms

My little classmate with the calliper on her leg also had a shrivelled arm which she couldn't use because its muscles no longer worked. I never saw callipers on arms.

I remember being put next to this little gil in a game that involved forming a circle of linked hands. As she couldn't move her arm, I had to take the initiative of taking hold of her hand which felt small, lifeless and cold in mine. It was an uneasy experience for a child so young, although of course it was far worse for her. I feel strongly that if only her disability had been explained to the class and we had been told how we could help, her life would have been much pleasanter. Even at the age of five, we would have been old enough to understand and help, but we were left with only gossip to find out what was the matter with her.

Polio affecting lungs - the iron lung treatment

Polio was life-threatening when it affected the lungs because the paralysis prevented normal breathing. There was a treatment but it was not quick and was seriously unpleasant.

The treatment was to place the child - it usually was a child - inside a large metal tube-like container with a pump which pumped air in and out. This was called an iron lung because the changes in pressure effectively breathed for the child.

I can hardly imagine how awful being in an iron lung must have been. Patients had to lie there on their backs for days or even weeks at a time with only their heads exposed, and the pump was noisy. I understand that patients were slid briefly out of the iron lung for attention to their bodily functions, either at regular intervals or when the need could be seen through the portholes.

The iron lung was, I suppose, a forerunner of the ventilator which is the last defence in the coronavirus pandemic. Iron lungs, though were before the digital age, so with fewer refinements. If there was a power cut - commonplace during and after World War Two - the iron lung had to be pumped by hand.

The iron lung treatment provided a respite while the lungs healed themselves. Then patients could come out of it, but if the lungs did not heal, the patients usually died. There are, though, reports of people needing the support of an iron lung as adults.

A Polio vaccine at last!

Thankfully, a vaccine against Polio became available for the public in the mid-1950s. It was served as a few drops on a suger cube. I had mine, along with all the other undergraduates at my university. We were called in large groups to stand in a long line and a nurse moved along the line, serving each of us in turn. It was all rather amusing at the time with giggles all round. Only in later life did I realise how grateful I should have been for it.

If you can add anything to this page or provide a photo, I would be pleased if you would contact me.

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