REMEMBERING THE SCIENTIST WHO BEAT POLIO

DR. J. E. SALK 
(28 Oct 1914 - 23 Jun 1995)

New York born Jonas Edward Salk of Russian-Jewish parentage was destined to be the scientist to discover the first effective and safe vaccine against the dreaded polio virus, thus changing the world as it were...

Polio has been a disabling and life-threatening contagious disease of viral origin since ancient times, affecting the nerves and leaving those recovered with varying degrees of paralysis, including the post-polio syndrome (PPS) that can occur decades later, binding quite a many to the wheelchair...

While polio outbreaks overwhelmed the US early in the 20th century, President Frederick Roosevelt established the March of Dimes for it's research, with cooperation from the affluent...

From a physician at Mount Sinai Hospital after graduation in 1939, Dr. Salk went to Michigan in 1942 on an Influenza vaccine research assignment. In 1945 he became the director of the Virus Research Laboratory at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. It was here that he developed a safe vaccine to wipe out the scourge of polio with a “killed” virus. With trials beginning in 1954 on one million kids in the 6-9 age group, it was on 12 April 1955 that the Salk Vaccine earned the certificate of safety, signifying an important milestone in medicine for humankind...

Without any efforts to patent, profit or seek a Nobel from his discovery, not to mention the increasing reach of the vaccine, Dr. Salk founded the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, California, in 1963 with a $20 million grant from the National Science Foundation, and support from the March of Dimes...

Spending his final years in quest of an AIDS vaccine, Dr. Salk passed away this day, 1995 at La Jolla, California. Though the Sabin Vaccine (discovered by Albert Bruce Sabin) found favour and compliance being an oral vaccine, from 1962, Dr. Salk would be always remembered for his pioneering efforts in the fight against the dreaded disease...

I end with Dr. Salk’s quote on life -

“Hope lies in dreams, in imagination and in the courage of those who dare to make dreams into reality."

🙏🙏🌹💐   🇺🇸 

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