WEBVTT - How We Almost Got Rid of Polio 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:02.640 Hey, everybody. You may not know this yet, and if 0:00:02.720 --> 0:00:06.279 you don't, prepare to be blown away. We are creating 0:00:06.400 --> 0:00:09.440 right now the first ever Stuff you Should Know book. 0:00:09.560 --> 0:00:13.280 It's called Stuff you Should Know Colon, an incomplete compendium 0:00:13.280 --> 0:00:16.560 of mostly interesting things. And you can preorder it now, 0:00:16.880 --> 0:00:19.560 that's right. And if you pre order, everyone, there's an 0:00:19.560 --> 0:00:22.400 incentive because you get a free gift. And don't worry 0:00:22.440 --> 0:00:24.800 if you've already pre ordered, because you can just head 0:00:24.800 --> 0:00:28.680 on over to stuff you Should Read books dot com. 0:00:28.760 --> 0:00:31.400 It's a very beautiful little web page and it's got 0:00:31.600 --> 0:00:34.400 all the information. And if you already pre ordered, can't 0:00:34.400 --> 0:00:36.519 you just like upload your receipt and get that pre 0:00:36.680 --> 0:00:39.120 order gift. Yep, you can, and they will mail it 0:00:39.159 --> 0:00:40.720 off to you and you will get into mail and 0:00:40.720 --> 0:00:42.760 you say, oh, thank you, don't mind if I do. 0:00:42.880 --> 0:00:45.040 And it's a poster that you will love and cherish 0:00:45.120 --> 0:00:48.280 and possibly pass on down to your children as an heirloom. 0:00:48.440 --> 0:00:50.920 That's right, everyone, We couldn't be more excited about this book. 0:00:50.920 --> 0:00:54.120 It's really coming together. Well, it's us through and through 0:00:54.280 --> 0:00:57.200 and you can go check out some excerpts at stuff 0:00:57.280 --> 0:01:01.320 you Should Read books dot com. Welcome to Stuff you 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:10.520 Should Know, a production of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, 0:01:10.640 --> 0:01:13.760 and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. 0:01:13.920 --> 0:01:16.280 Chuck Bryan over there, and this is Stuff you Should 0:01:16.319 --> 0:01:21.600 Know Poliocast. That's right. Before we get going, though, we 0:01:21.640 --> 0:01:23.399 want to tell everyone that we have a book coming 0:01:23.440 --> 0:01:27.880 out called Stuff You Should Know Colon, an incomplete compendium 0:01:27.880 --> 0:01:31.840 of mostly interesting things that you can buy and pre 0:01:31.920 --> 0:01:36.360 order online, and pre orders are very um it's a 0:01:36.440 --> 0:01:40.039 very big deal to pre order the book. It's I 0:01:40.160 --> 0:01:42.280 never knew what a big deal it was, but pre 0:01:42.360 --> 0:01:46.080 orders are very important for the author, are they? I 0:01:46.120 --> 0:01:49.160 didn't really hope. I'm kind of worried. Now they're a 0:01:49.160 --> 0:01:53.200 big deal. Okay, well, uh yeah, I guess the very body. 0:01:53.720 --> 0:01:56.080 You won't regret pre ordering the book. How about that? 0:01:56.560 --> 0:01:59.240 And why? Because you get a special gift. Not only 0:01:59.280 --> 0:02:00.800 that you get us I shall get for sure. You 0:02:00.800 --> 0:02:03.120 just go upload your receipt at stuff you Should Read 0:02:03.200 --> 0:02:06.320 books dot com. Um. But also the book itself is 0:02:06.360 --> 0:02:08.240 really great too. I think you're gonna like it. Twenty 0:02:08.320 --> 0:02:11.640 six full robust chapters that are going to just knock 0:02:11.639 --> 0:02:14.040 your socks off. And it's a Stuff you Should Know 0:02:14.120 --> 0:02:17.919 we that's right, and we got great illustrations by Carl Minardo. 0:02:18.360 --> 0:02:20.880 We had a great writer working with us named Neils Parker, 0:02:21.760 --> 0:02:24.040 and a great publisher and flat Iron, and we're just 0:02:24.080 --> 0:02:26.919 super excited about it and we appreciate your support. Yep. 0:02:27.240 --> 0:02:32.080 So you can go preorder that book everywhere. Okay, um wow, Chuck, 0:02:32.160 --> 0:02:35.400 we're getting really good at that. Now let's talk polio. 0:02:36.400 --> 0:02:38.680 So we're not good at it's transitioning. No, we're not. 0:02:38.760 --> 0:02:43.680 We never have been. Um So polio I was when 0:02:43.680 --> 0:02:46.800 I was researching this, I kept running across whenever I 0:02:46.800 --> 0:02:49.080 typed in polio, you know that auto suggest in the 0:02:49.120 --> 0:02:52.440 search bar um, it would say things like does polio 0:02:52.560 --> 0:02:56.840 still exist? And it absolutely does. But it's one of 0:02:56.880 --> 0:03:01.560 those diseases that we're really really lead close to eradicating 0:03:01.919 --> 0:03:07.240 thanks to UH an extraordinarily robust vaccination campaign UM one 0:03:07.280 --> 0:03:11.040 of the first really big vaccination campaigns UM in the 0:03:11.200 --> 0:03:13.639 history of the world, and it was also one of 0:03:13.680 --> 0:03:16.679 the most successful too, so much that we're down to 0:03:16.760 --> 0:03:20.840 just three countries. I believe Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Nigeria are 0:03:20.880 --> 0:03:24.000 the only three countries where polio is still endemic, where 0:03:24.040 --> 0:03:27.079 like you can just walk around and catch polio. Um. 0:03:28.560 --> 0:03:31.040 And there are outbreaks in other countries. We'll talk about 0:03:31.080 --> 0:03:34.840 exactly why. But it went from this global worldwide problem 0:03:34.880 --> 0:03:37.320 at the beginning of the twentieth century down to three 0:03:37.360 --> 0:03:41.120 countries and we're like that close to to getting rid 0:03:41.120 --> 0:03:46.480 of it forever from the planet basically. Yeah. So um. 0:03:46.520 --> 0:03:50.040 And it's interesting to to read about polio and it's 0:03:50.120 --> 0:03:54.240 vaccine during the middle of our own pandemic with coronavirus 0:03:54.280 --> 0:03:57.640 and COVID nineteen because there's there's a lot of similarities 0:03:57.680 --> 0:04:01.680 and overlap. It's interesting there's a pandemic. Yeah, that's why 0:04:01.720 --> 0:04:04.280 I haven't seen you in three months. I know. Are 0:04:04.280 --> 0:04:08.640 you getting used to it yet? I mean sure, just 0:04:08.720 --> 0:04:12.800 as anyone gets used to something that stinks. Oh thank you. 0:04:13.520 --> 0:04:15.400 I don't mean not seeing you, I mean everything but short, 0:04:15.480 --> 0:04:18.880 that's part of that, that's for sure, part of that. 0:04:19.120 --> 0:04:21.120 But it is weird talking about it, for sure, because 0:04:21.120 --> 0:04:24.680 there are some some real similarities. For sure. Yeah. So 0:04:25.000 --> 0:04:30.800 polio is the disease. Uh, But polio virus is the 0:04:30.839 --> 0:04:33.800 antio virus, which is a virus of the intestinal tract, 0:04:34.560 --> 0:04:37.760 which is an RNA virus like COVID nineteen. Um. But 0:04:37.920 --> 0:04:42.040 the disease itself, like covid is the sickness, polio is 0:04:42.120 --> 0:04:47.400 the disease, as coronavirus is the poliovirus. I mixed that 0:04:47.440 --> 0:04:50.760 all up, but I think it's right. So coronavirus is 0:04:50.800 --> 0:04:56.400 to covid what poliovirus is to polio. Yeah, that's the 0:04:56.440 --> 0:05:00.000 cleaner way to say it, right. And then apparently polio specifically, 0:05:00.120 --> 0:05:05.440 if you say, um, oh this person, my grandfather had polio, um, 0:05:05.760 --> 0:05:08.240 you're not talking about just a polio infection. There's a 0:05:08.279 --> 0:05:11.320 specific kind of disease that you can get from the 0:05:11.320 --> 0:05:14.440 polio virus where it attacks your central nervous system and 0:05:14.600 --> 0:05:17.560 can cause all sorts of problems. And that specifically is 0:05:17.600 --> 0:05:20.440 what somebody's saying when they say they had polio, which 0:05:20.480 --> 0:05:24.120 is in that case called polio mielitis, Which is what 0:05:24.160 --> 0:05:26.920 people are talking about when they say when they're talking 0:05:26.960 --> 0:05:30.640 about polio, the disease. Yeah, because a lot of people 0:05:31.000 --> 0:05:35.799 got the poliovirus UM didn't know it had no symptoms. 0:05:36.279 --> 0:05:38.720 Your body kicks in the gear, that immune system just 0:05:38.760 --> 0:05:42.760 fights it off. You got those antibodies for life, and 0:05:42.800 --> 0:05:46.800 that's it. That happened a lot um. But yeah, like 0:05:46.839 --> 0:05:49.359 you said, if you if you get polio, that means 0:05:49.360 --> 0:05:51.960 that it hits your your central nervous system. And we'll 0:05:52.000 --> 0:05:56.039 get more into detail about all this, but UM polio 0:05:56.160 --> 0:05:59.279 virus is where it colonizes is in the throat and 0:05:59.320 --> 0:06:04.560 the digest of system. And we're talking about uh, your 0:06:05.120 --> 0:06:10.120 feces being contaminated or infectious and contaminated and your saliva 0:06:11.080 --> 0:06:13.880 depending on how you get it. So there's basically two 0:06:13.920 --> 0:06:16.920 ways to pass it along, either with your poop or 0:06:16.960 --> 0:06:21.560 with your saliva. UM. And the fecal transmission is much 0:06:21.600 --> 0:06:27.160 more prevalent, especially in the developing world because of poor sanitation, 0:06:27.800 --> 0:06:30.480 and like if you look at just the natural history 0:06:30.560 --> 0:06:33.839 of the virus, of the poliovirus, it's it's ideal is 0:06:33.880 --> 0:06:36.600 to just replicate, right, That's the whole purpose of the viruses, 0:06:36.680 --> 0:06:39.400 Just make as many copies of itself as possible and 0:06:39.440 --> 0:06:44.320 so living in the water um, the drinking water supply 0:06:44.800 --> 0:06:49.120 and then infecting people UM, infecting their gut, replicating being 0:06:49.200 --> 0:06:52.320 passed as feces back into the water supply to infect 0:06:52.360 --> 0:06:56.279 other people, but without you know, really developing symptoms and people. 0:06:56.440 --> 0:07:01.400 That's ideal for for the virus itself. UM. Every once 0:07:01.400 --> 0:07:03.680 in a while though, I thinking about one quarter of 0:07:03.720 --> 0:07:08.880 people who become infected the the the poliovirus will enter 0:07:08.920 --> 0:07:10.960 the blood stream, It'll leave the gut and enter the 0:07:10.960 --> 0:07:15.320 blood stream and will produce what's called viremia, where um 0:07:15.360 --> 0:07:18.040 it infects the blood, it starts to infect other organs 0:07:18.200 --> 0:07:20.880 and those people will develop flu like symptoms for a 0:07:20.920 --> 0:07:24.119 couple of days. That sees, that's still not that bad. 0:07:24.240 --> 0:07:28.120 Probably nothing we would amount at a global eradication campaign against. 0:07:28.600 --> 0:07:31.720 It's just that in a very small proportion of people 0:07:31.760 --> 0:07:35.600 who become infected, the poliovirus not only infects the blood stream, 0:07:35.720 --> 0:07:39.120 it actually travels to the central nervous system and attacks that. 0:07:39.480 --> 0:07:42.040 And then that is the real problem that comes from polio. 0:07:42.120 --> 0:07:46.120 What we were talking about earlier, poliomyelitis. Yeah, and no 0:07:46.160 --> 0:07:53.240 one knows why that happens. Uh, no one knows. I 0:07:53.280 --> 0:07:56.960 mean basically they just think it's it is completely random. 0:07:57.000 --> 0:07:59.600 I mean, that's that seems to be the case of 0:07:59.720 --> 0:08:03.040 whether or not you get the paralytic version or not. Uh, 0:08:03.080 --> 0:08:06.840 it is not many people, but when you spread those 0:08:06.920 --> 0:08:09.560 numbers out, it can be a lot of people. So 0:08:09.640 --> 0:08:13.240 when you look at numbers like uh point five percent 0:08:13.400 --> 0:08:18.920 of everyone infected UM have paralysis. If you look at 0:08:19.000 --> 0:08:23.920 a human population, that's a lot of people, right, Um Yeah, 0:08:24.000 --> 0:08:27.720 when when Yeah, just that very small percent of everybody 0:08:27.840 --> 0:08:30.080 or a ton of people around the world, and for 0:08:30.280 --> 0:08:34.360 centuries have you know, an infection. It does add up 0:08:34.440 --> 0:08:37.560 big time for sure enough. So and so not just 0:08:37.600 --> 0:08:41.800 the number also, chuck, but just the devastating effects that 0:08:41.960 --> 0:08:45.360 UM polio can have, poliomyelitis can have on a person. 0:08:45.840 --> 0:08:49.200 It's um, it's a really bad jam because not only 0:08:49.280 --> 0:08:53.920 can it cause what's called a cute flaccid paralysis, where 0:08:54.000 --> 0:08:58.920 your your motor neurons or your muscles are attacked so 0:08:58.960 --> 0:09:02.000 that you can't you your muscle and your um, your 0:09:02.040 --> 0:09:05.439 limb starts to wither, maybe you just become fully paralyzed. 0:09:05.920 --> 0:09:09.400 It can also UM travel to your brain and affect 0:09:09.679 --> 0:09:14.000 things like you're swallowing, reflex or breathing, and so it 0:09:14.040 --> 0:09:16.800 can very very easily kill you when it starts to 0:09:16.800 --> 0:09:22.840 to progress to the central nervous system phase of poliomyelitis. Yeah, 0:09:22.880 --> 0:09:26.120 and there's no treatment for polio UM and we'll talk 0:09:26.160 --> 0:09:29.120 about the vaccine here in a minute to a great extent. 0:09:29.240 --> 0:09:32.520 But um, it's just like any other virus. You let it, 0:09:32.679 --> 0:09:35.560 you let it run its course. Um, your body will 0:09:35.760 --> 0:09:38.520 probably do the right thing and step up and fight 0:09:38.600 --> 0:09:41.120 it back and not let it get to your blood stream. 0:09:41.160 --> 0:09:42.480 But like you said, even if it gets to your 0:09:42.480 --> 0:09:45.520 blood stream, you might just get sick. Um. But that 0:09:45.600 --> 0:09:51.000 point five percent chance that you actually have the paralytic version. Um, 0:09:51.040 --> 0:09:53.679 there is no cure for that. No, which was weird. 0:09:53.720 --> 0:09:55.440 I was like, so what you're you know, you're just 0:09:55.480 --> 0:09:58.800 a goner if you get pilot poliomyelitis or that's what 0:09:58.880 --> 0:10:01.760 the case was. And apparently your body can still fight 0:10:01.800 --> 0:10:04.600 it off. You can get polio myelitis and if you 0:10:04.679 --> 0:10:07.440 receive the proper care um. One of the one of 0:10:07.440 --> 0:10:11.199 the better um inventions to combat polio is called the 0:10:11.240 --> 0:10:14.920 iron lung, which would breathe for you using a bellows 0:10:14.920 --> 0:10:17.280 and negative and positive pressure to move your chest up 0:10:17.280 --> 0:10:22.240 and down. Um, Like that could keep you alive long 0:10:22.360 --> 0:10:24.160 enough to give you a chance for your body to 0:10:24.240 --> 0:10:27.480 fight off the infection with your immune system. But like, 0:10:27.720 --> 0:10:30.360 that's not a cure. That's just keeping you alive long 0:10:30.440 --> 0:10:32.839 enough for your body to fight it off. It was 0:10:32.880 --> 0:10:35.040 really surprising to me that there's still to this day 0:10:35.080 --> 0:10:38.480 no treatment for polio. Yeah, I can't help but think 0:10:38.520 --> 0:10:41.760 of the Big Lebowski when I think of iron lungs. 0:10:43.120 --> 0:10:45.640 Who is in an iron lung in that Remember when 0:10:45.640 --> 0:10:49.920 they go to visit the they think the kid um 0:10:50.200 --> 0:10:54.240 stole the car or they found it that they found 0:10:54.280 --> 0:10:55.800 the kids school work in the back of the car, 0:10:56.559 --> 0:10:58.199 and they got to his house and it was this 0:10:58.200 --> 0:11:02.319 this former TV writer huho, who's inside and he's in 0:11:02.360 --> 0:11:06.199 an iron lung. I genuinely don't remember that part. I'm 0:11:06.200 --> 0:11:08.320 sure I'm being shouted at by some of our listeners, 0:11:08.320 --> 0:11:11.400 but sorry, it was played for laughs. The one I 0:11:11.440 --> 0:11:14.960 think of is um Ralph Macchio and the Outsiders after 0:11:15.000 --> 0:11:17.800 he gets burned from running in that house to save 0:11:17.800 --> 0:11:20.560 those in iron lung. That's what I thought, and so 0:11:20.600 --> 0:11:23.320 I looked it up to verify, and there's no mention 0:11:23.360 --> 0:11:24.640 of it. So I guess when I was a kid, 0:11:24.720 --> 0:11:26.760 I just made up that Ralph Maccio is in an 0:11:26.760 --> 0:11:30.200 iron lung and the Outsiders. If I'm not mistaken, he 0:11:30.280 --> 0:11:33.160 was just had a I guess what you would call 0:11:33.160 --> 0:11:38.280 a respirator today, Okay, but wasn't then. Yeah, I think 0:11:38.280 --> 0:11:41.400 he was. I think he was faced down and traction 0:11:41.640 --> 0:11:45.640 and suspended and on a respirator. If I'm not mistaken, well, 0:11:45.720 --> 0:11:49.400 my my tiny little impressionable brain translated that into an 0:11:49.400 --> 0:11:53.400 iron lung. That's okay, stay gold, my brain hasn't gotten 0:11:53.480 --> 0:11:58.079 much better, Chuck, Sure it has so. Um So you 0:11:58.120 --> 0:12:01.480 can survive. You can fend off a polio infection, even 0:12:01.559 --> 0:12:05.840 with polio myelitis. But the problem is that very frequently 0:12:05.880 --> 0:12:09.640 would would not let you survive. Um, it would kill you. 0:12:09.720 --> 0:12:13.360 And so, like we said, just mounting this campaign became 0:12:13.480 --> 0:12:18.640 kind of paramount. But polio is tough because they think 0:12:18.720 --> 0:12:21.840 it's such an old virus. They think it's been around 0:12:21.880 --> 0:12:24.520 for a very very long time. And that's kind of 0:12:24.559 --> 0:12:28.520 evidence by the fact that polio is um it's only 0:12:28.600 --> 0:12:31.640 humans that that it lives in and tries to replicate, 0:12:31.679 --> 0:12:34.320 and there's it's not like other viruses where there's like 0:12:34.400 --> 0:12:38.080 reservoir animals that it can um, it can hang out 0:12:38.120 --> 0:12:40.760 in and and and just basically stay alive until it 0:12:40.800 --> 0:12:45.120 can infect a human. It's just humans basically, although there 0:12:45.200 --> 0:12:48.320 was a case in nineteen sixty six of some chimps 0:12:48.360 --> 0:12:55.360 becoming infected from humans with polio. In that sense, yeah, uh, 0:12:55.400 --> 0:12:57.680 And you know, if we need to um. If you 0:12:57.720 --> 0:13:01.679 need to go over viruses again, folks, look no further 0:13:01.800 --> 0:13:05.720 than the recent stuff you should know Classic from March 0:13:05.840 --> 0:13:10.480 twenty Virus Talk with Josh and Chuck. That was from 0:13:10.480 --> 0:13:14.040 March twenty, the rerelease What do you what do we 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:19.360 call those classics? Select? Aren't you like one half of 0:13:19.400 --> 0:13:22.080 this podcast? I am, but I call them classics in 0:13:22.120 --> 0:13:26.120 my brain. I don't know what the official branding is. Selects. Yeah, 0:13:26.280 --> 0:13:31.360 like we have hands selected this classic episode. Yeah, classics. 0:13:30.360 --> 0:13:34.280 I think if you scramble the words selects, classics is 0:13:34.320 --> 0:13:37.320 in there somewhere, but I think spelled. But yeah, that 0:13:37.320 --> 0:13:39.320 one just came out recently. So that'll catch up on 0:13:39.360 --> 0:13:41.720 what a virus is. But should we take a break 0:13:41.720 --> 0:13:44.280 and talk a little bit about the ancient history? Perhaps 0:13:44.320 --> 0:13:48.280 a folio? Yes, all right, we'll be right back everybody. 0:13:48.400 --> 0:13:51.400 I want to learn about how to take the perfect 0:13:51.640 --> 0:13:55.120 all about fractals, think it's un the Lizzie Border murders, 0:13:55.120 --> 0:13:59.160 that kind of all runs on the plane everything we 0:13:59.200 --> 0:14:21.640 should know. Ward up, Jerry, all right, so I mentioned 0:14:21.760 --> 0:14:27.000 ancient history. Um, we don't know exactly where polio started 0:14:27.040 --> 0:14:32.560 because old diseases have shoddy record keeping. Um, they just 0:14:32.560 --> 0:14:34.560 didn't keep up with stuff like they do now, but 0:14:34.720 --> 0:14:37.240 we do. You know, if you looked at some of 0:14:37.360 --> 0:14:41.200 the mummies in ancient Egypt, you might see some limb 0:14:41.200 --> 0:14:46.080 deformities that could have been polio. U. There are UM 0:14:46.120 --> 0:14:49.840 paintings on walls and things that maybe could be polio. 0:14:50.000 --> 0:14:55.160 But this is us extrapolating this from a modern lens. Um. 0:14:55.320 --> 0:14:57.520 They you know, those limbs could have been smashed in 0:14:57.560 --> 0:15:03.120 a you know, heavy object accidents as well a combine accident. 0:15:03.600 --> 0:15:05.120 Well I was going to say that, but they didn't 0:15:05.160 --> 0:15:09.160 have combines, so um, a barge accident, how about that? 0:15:10.440 --> 0:15:15.400 So UM. Like, over the years, people were studying polio, 0:15:15.560 --> 0:15:16.960 and I mean we kind of started to get a 0:15:16.960 --> 0:15:19.880 pretty good handle on it. We didn't understand what viruses were, 0:15:19.960 --> 0:15:22.280 so we didn't know it was a virus until the 0:15:22.920 --> 0:15:26.800 twentieth century. No, the twentieth century, I think eight are old. 0:15:26.840 --> 0:15:31.800 Frank Carl Landsteiner, who developed UM blood types, was also 0:15:31.840 --> 0:15:34.360 the one of the two people who identified the polio 0:15:34.480 --> 0:15:37.680 virus in nineteen o eight, but other people had contributed 0:15:37.760 --> 0:15:40.359 up to that point. Like it was recognized as UM 0:15:40.400 --> 0:15:43.840 being an epidemic disease, that there were outbreaks that kind 0:15:43.880 --> 0:15:47.880 of stuff, and but everybody was kind of okay with 0:15:48.040 --> 0:15:51.360 polio existing, like it was not something that we were 0:15:51.360 --> 0:15:54.880 happy about, but nothing that like there was this great 0:15:55.040 --> 0:15:58.560 urgency to cure until about the beginning of the twentieth century. 0:15:58.760 --> 0:16:04.080 And they think that that people living together, close in 0:16:04.160 --> 0:16:12.040 close quarters, urbanization and better sanitation lead to polio outbreaks 0:16:12.280 --> 0:16:15.440 that hadn't been seen before because the better sanitation produced 0:16:15.440 --> 0:16:20.000 a population that had not been exposed to polio virus. Yeah, 0:16:20.080 --> 0:16:23.400 that seems counterintuitive, it does, but it makes sense because 0:16:23.440 --> 0:16:26.040 if you've got a virgin population, that thing can just 0:16:26.120 --> 0:16:28.720 hop from person to person to person, whereas if you 0:16:28.800 --> 0:16:33.400 have an endemic population where any proportion of the population 0:16:33.560 --> 0:16:36.840 is already immune from having been exposed to the virus before. 0:16:36.920 --> 0:16:39.440 Because don't forget, remember we said a lot of people, 0:16:39.520 --> 0:16:43.280 most people, I think people who are infected never even 0:16:43.320 --> 0:16:46.720 show any signs or symptoms. So if you don't have 0:16:46.800 --> 0:16:49.880 people like that anymore because of improved sanitation, but you 0:16:49.960 --> 0:16:53.160 also don't have a vaccine program, you've got a virgin population, 0:16:53.240 --> 0:16:57.040 that virus can just run rampant in and that's familiar 0:16:57.200 --> 0:17:00.240 that it does. That's what started happening in the early 0:17:00.280 --> 0:17:03.320 twentie century, and it started scaring the Bejesus out of 0:17:03.360 --> 0:17:07.560 parents because it was largely affecting kids. Yeah, and it 0:17:07.600 --> 0:17:11.720 happened in clusters, UM because it was so easily transmitted, 0:17:11.760 --> 0:17:14.280 and like you said, with the virgin population, that would 0:17:14.280 --> 0:17:17.639 be these big outbreaks and that causes panic, uh with 0:17:17.720 --> 0:17:22.440 parents especially UM. In nineteen sixteen in the US, six 0:17:22.480 --> 0:17:26.240 thousand people died from polio in about twenty seven thousand 0:17:26.240 --> 0:17:33.679 paralytic cases, UM ninety two paralytic cases. And also we 0:17:33.800 --> 0:17:36.000 said in our in our book, you remember in the Mr. 0:17:36.040 --> 0:17:40.080 Potato Head chapter that polio outbreak is what made Mr 0:17:40.160 --> 0:17:44.760 potato Head one of the big, the first big, because 0:17:44.800 --> 0:17:47.760 so many kids were We're stuck at home that summer 0:17:47.800 --> 0:17:51.400 because of a polio outbreak. That's right, and that that's 0:17:51.440 --> 0:17:54.000 exactly what happened, because you know, kind of mirroring what 0:17:54.040 --> 0:17:58.480 we're seeing now is they would shut down parks, in 0:17:58.520 --> 0:18:03.000 swimming pools and schools in public events. UM and America 0:18:03.160 --> 0:18:06.119 rallied behind it back then and said, yeah, that's what 0:18:06.160 --> 0:18:09.360 we should do for the good of the public. UM. 0:18:09.400 --> 0:18:12.560 It's not happening now, unfortunately, but back then everyone got 0:18:12.560 --> 0:18:16.760 on board. UM. Between I think a quarter of a 0:18:16.800 --> 0:18:21.840 million and six hundred and fifty thousand Americans. Um, we're 0:18:21.960 --> 0:18:24.480 alive at any given time in the twentieth century that 0:18:24.520 --> 0:18:30.000 had lifelong uh issues caused by polio. Right, that's a 0:18:30.040 --> 0:18:33.040 lot of people. I mean, that's a real problem. You know. 0:18:33.640 --> 0:18:35.879 That's not over the twentieth century, that's at any given 0:18:35.920 --> 0:18:39.680 point in the twentieth century, right, Yeah, at any given point. 0:18:40.240 --> 0:18:43.320 So you can kind of understand why around then, you know, 0:18:43.600 --> 0:18:48.240 especially when when people were seeing entire classrooms of children 0:18:48.880 --> 0:18:52.679 struck down, you know, with polio, some of whom you know, 0:18:52.760 --> 0:18:56.359 went on to have lifelong mobility issues, some of whom died. 0:18:56.920 --> 0:19:00.439 Um that that was that scared parents a lot, and 0:19:00.440 --> 0:19:03.240 it's scared everybody so much so that it kind of 0:19:03.359 --> 0:19:07.479 laid the groundwork for this big national and actually an 0:19:07.480 --> 0:19:10.960 international push toward coming up with, if not a treatment, 0:19:11.000 --> 0:19:13.960 which they tried at first and found that was not happening, 0:19:14.200 --> 0:19:17.440 then a vaccine for polio. And and that's exactly what 0:19:17.520 --> 0:19:22.560 we did. Yeah. Uh. And a big driver for this 0:19:22.680 --> 0:19:25.880 vaccine was a little organization called the March of Dimes, 0:19:26.520 --> 0:19:31.280 which was originally founded by Franklin Roosevelt, was called the 0:19:31.359 --> 0:19:36.080 National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis And I never knew this, 0:19:36.200 --> 0:19:39.760 but they had a march and people would send dimes 0:19:40.560 --> 0:19:43.000 as donations to the organization, and that's why it's called 0:19:43.000 --> 0:19:46.640 the March of Dimes. It's amazing. And because of that, 0:19:46.840 --> 0:19:49.800 because of all those individuals sending in dimes to the 0:19:49.800 --> 0:19:55.040 March of Dimes or to them, the Infantile Paralysis Foundation, UM, 0:19:56.160 --> 0:20:00.600 the that laid the groundwork for the financial support for 0:20:00.840 --> 0:20:04.080 all of this research that was going on, specifically for 0:20:04.119 --> 0:20:06.359 the research of one of the guys who came up 0:20:06.359 --> 0:20:08.560 with a vaccine for polio. Because we actually have more 0:20:08.560 --> 0:20:11.480 than one UM. But the most famous of them all 0:20:11.600 --> 0:20:15.560 was Jonas Salk, who came into the picture in about 0:20:16.600 --> 0:20:21.160 and because of those dimes that were contributed by average, 0:20:21.200 --> 0:20:25.640 everyday people, because those that money directly funded his research. 0:20:25.920 --> 0:20:31.240 He very famously refused to patent the UM the vaccine 0:20:31.280 --> 0:20:33.359 that he came up with for polio and just said, 0:20:33.400 --> 0:20:37.680 this belongs to the world. Yeah, just like a farmer, bros. 0:20:38.040 --> 0:20:44.280 Same exactly, same morals, right right, UM, so this is 0:20:44.320 --> 0:20:45.680 a good chance. I'm glad when we get to do 0:20:45.760 --> 0:20:49.560 shows like this because um, Jonas Salt gets so much 0:20:49.600 --> 0:20:52.760 credit and deservedly so as a genuinely great human that 0:20:52.880 --> 0:20:55.600 walked the planet. Um. But a lot of people had 0:20:56.320 --> 0:20:59.120 chipped in over the years to get this vaccine where 0:20:59.119 --> 0:21:01.680 it was. And we get a chance to talk about 0:21:01.680 --> 0:21:04.280 those people now, which is always fun. UM. In the 0:21:04.359 --> 0:21:09.440 nineteen forties, late nineteen forties, John Franklin Enders, Thomas huckle 0:21:09.560 --> 0:21:15.320 Weller and Frederick Chapman Robbins, all three serial killers. That's right, 0:21:16.000 --> 0:21:19.600 they figured out how to grow the poliovirus culture in 0:21:19.640 --> 0:21:23.000 a lab, which if you want a vaccine, that's the 0:21:23.040 --> 0:21:25.520 first big step is to grow that culture in a lab. 0:21:25.960 --> 0:21:28.879 And they won in nineteen fifty four for those efforts. Uh, 0:21:28.920 --> 0:21:31.680 they won the Nobel Prize in Medicine, which is great. Yeah, 0:21:31.680 --> 0:21:35.520 it was um so the first that was a huge 0:21:35.520 --> 0:21:38.080 first step. Like you were saying, the people had tried 0:21:38.160 --> 0:21:42.320 to create a vaccine even before that first step, though, 0:21:43.080 --> 0:21:46.440 I guess the old fashioned way. UM. Brody and Colemer 0:21:46.520 --> 0:21:49.359 John Colemer, I don't know Brody's first name, but they 0:21:49.480 --> 0:21:53.080 when they were working together, UM, they created a vaccine 0:21:53.119 --> 0:21:57.879 that actually killed uh, five of their ten thousand test subjects, 0:21:58.359 --> 0:22:02.199 which was not um. It wasn't good. Uh, and it 0:22:02.280 --> 0:22:05.880 actually kind of set the whole the whole vaccine UM 0:22:06.080 --> 0:22:10.360 movement back a hint. But astoundingly, it didn't kill it. 0:22:10.720 --> 0:22:13.760 And rather than saying like, no, we're not going to 0:22:13.880 --> 0:22:17.600 try this, people looked at polio cases and said this 0:22:17.680 --> 0:22:20.160 is so bad. We need to keep pushing forward despite 0:22:20.200 --> 0:22:23.840 that and so UM. By the time Salt came along 0:22:24.320 --> 0:22:28.239 and started working on his vaccine, you know, people were 0:22:28.280 --> 0:22:31.640 already a little jumpy about the idea UM, and it 0:22:31.680 --> 0:22:34.240 was made all the more so that he was trying 0:22:34.560 --> 0:22:39.639 UH an unproven form of vaccine, whereas most vaccines used 0:22:40.240 --> 0:22:45.040 UM attenuated virus, which is it's live, but it's a 0:22:45.080 --> 0:22:48.679 weekend version of the virus, and it's in a UM. 0:22:48.720 --> 0:22:52.560 It's it's in a much smaller dose. What what Salt 0:22:52.720 --> 0:22:56.000 was suggesting, what he wanted to use was a an 0:22:56.000 --> 0:22:59.480 inactivated virus, which is it's dead in the in the 0:22:59.520 --> 0:23:03.240 sense that can't replicate no longer. It's been treated with formaldehyde. 0:23:03.960 --> 0:23:06.439 But yeah, it's it's a huge dose of it. So 0:23:06.480 --> 0:23:10.119 if it's not dead, you're in big trouble. Yeah, And 0:23:10.119 --> 0:23:11.600 it was a big deal of the time because it 0:23:11.640 --> 0:23:15.480 was a new science and a lot of scientists said 0:23:15.520 --> 0:23:19.720 that I don't think you could administer this much even 0:23:20.400 --> 0:23:24.480 uh killed virus safely. And so what you had was 0:23:24.480 --> 0:23:26.879 a couple of different things going on, a couple of 0:23:27.480 --> 0:23:31.000 potential pathways to take. Was give a little bit of 0:23:31.040 --> 0:23:34.800 that weakened virus that's still alive to kids, which we 0:23:34.840 --> 0:23:37.159 know is going to infect them with a virus. So 0:23:37.200 --> 0:23:41.280 it's gonna generate those antibodies, but hopefully it's not gonna 0:23:41.440 --> 0:23:44.320 be strong enough to get to that central nervous system 0:23:44.359 --> 0:23:50.960 point of infection or super dose them with this inactive virus, 0:23:51.000 --> 0:23:53.840 and that's going to cause antibodies in the blood, so 0:23:53.960 --> 0:23:58.400 that will prevent polio from happening. That will keep it 0:23:58.720 --> 0:24:02.200 from going to the central nervous system. They knew that, uh, 0:24:02.240 --> 0:24:05.080 and that's great news. But boy, you better be sure 0:24:05.560 --> 0:24:08.880 that that virus is perfect, because if it's not, then 0:24:08.920 --> 0:24:12.240 you're in big trouble. Right And not only not only 0:24:12.320 --> 0:24:15.400 that that's that's a big risk with it, but if 0:24:15.400 --> 0:24:17.960 you do it right, if the risk goes very close 0:24:18.000 --> 0:24:21.600 to zero. The other problem with it is because it 0:24:21.760 --> 0:24:25.080 produces antibodies in the blood stream, that leaves out the gut, 0:24:25.359 --> 0:24:28.920 which means that you could still be infected by polio 0:24:29.200 --> 0:24:32.080 and colonize your gut and replicate and be passed in 0:24:32.080 --> 0:24:34.800