THE PREVENTION OF POLIO
Very much in the public mind– both professional and lay-at this moment is the prevention of polio (Acute Anterior Polio- myelitis). It is only right that this matter should be of concern, since polio has been increasing in frequency during the last quarter-century. Hand in hand with the increase in frequency of this disease has gone a greater incidence of mortality as well as of victims with permanent deformities resulting from Infantile.
Little note has been made of the thousands of polio patients who do not develop paralysis or who recover completely from the paralytic manifestations of the disease. Perhaps this is only natural, since man in prone to react vigorously to the unusual and spectacular in any manifestation of health or disease.
Under the aegis of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, researchers had sought for years to develop a safe and adequate means for the prevention of polio. The result was the Salk vaccine. This substance was subjected to extensive field trials in 1954, evaluated and presented in April 1955 to the expectant professional and lay public as a safe and effective preventive of polio.
Elaborate programs for the distribution and administration of the Salk vaccine had already been established by the Health Departments of the various states and municipalities throughout the country, ready to be activated on V-Day. With the announcement of April 12 that the Salk vaccine was up to 90 percent effective against polio, these programs began to swing into action. Public enthusiasm, both lay and professional, was held in check only by the possibility that adequate supplies of vaccine might not be available. Polio would be licked, however, as vaccine was produced in larger and larger quantities.
The whole program came to a sudden and jarring stop when it was learned that some of the children give Salk vaccine had developed paralytic polio. More cases were reported in a short time. A few victims died. It was determined that most of the cases had received vaccine manufactured by a single California concern. The remedy was simple: call in all outstanding supplies of the questionable vaccine, then get on with the program; the children must be protected; delay is dangerous with the polio season so close.
However, the U. S. Public Health Service stepped in and froze existing supplies of vaccine until extensive re-checks of its safety had been made and more rigid standards imposed on manufacturers as a means of protecting the public against possible harm from the vaccine.
The result of all this has been a dampening of public enthusiasm for the polio prevention program and a slowing down of the whole operation. Much bitter recrimination has circulated among the various principals in this tragic anticlimax; but the public should be grateful to the U.S. Public Health Service for its determination to halt the program until satisfied of the safety of the Salk vaccine.
This brief review of the “fiasco” of the Salk vaccine points up the difference between the inherent dangers in the methods of immunization advocated by official medicine and the perfect safety of those used by Homoeopathy. Had the public been aware of the harmless effectiveness of homoeopathic immunizing methods and had homoeopathic polio prevention had the blessing of the all-powerful National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, no such “fiasco” could have taken place as in the case of the Salk vaccine.
In order to convince the public and the Foundation, as well as the medical profession, that homoeopathic methods can and do prevent infantile paralysis, the Illinois Homoeopathic and the New York Homoeopathic Medical Societies have undertaken a joint program for the purpose of demonstrating this fact. The goal is 50,000 immunizations.
The program is under the direction of The Homoeopathic Research Committee of the Institute. If set up properly, it will be able to demonstrate beyond a doubt that Homoeopathy can produce a safe, sane and effective means of immunizing people against polio. Most homoeopaths already know this is so, but no steps have ever been taken to proven it. The success of the program will depend upon a carefully thought out modus operandi carried out over a sufficiently long period to be convincing.
A single summer will not be enough. That the Salk vaccine was tested during only a single polio season is one of the factors that casts a doubt on the validity of its announced effectiveness. Homoeopaths must not make the same mistake in their enthusiasm for the program. The approach should be one of open-minded objectiveness. We shall be attempting to prove something which we believe to be but are not sure is true and the experiment should be carried out in an atmosphere of scepticism rather than in a spirit of pre-convinced and prejudiced enthusiasm.
Although all homoeopaths are asked to cooperate in this program, no one has received from the Committee an outline of the procedure to be followed. Let us hope that the Committee of the procedure to be followed. Let us hope that the Committee is aware of the passage of time as well as of the importance of the undertaking. The project is very much worth while but is valueless unless put into action.
The Recorder is ready to publicize the Committees program, but first it mast have a program to publicity.
American Homeopathy Doctor.
Rabe graduated from the New York Homeopathic Medical College and trained under Timothy Field Allen and William Tod Helmuth.
Rabe was President of the International Hahnemannian Association, editor in chief of the Homeopathic Recorder, and he wrote Medical Therapeutics for daily reference. Rabe was Dean and Professor of Homeopathic Therapeutics at the New York Homeopathic Medical College.