Polio

POLIO

As the thirty first president of the United States, Herbert Hoover, says "Children are our most valuable natural resource". What we do here is not for ourselves only. We also try our best for our children since they are our happiness, wealth and future, i.e. everything. It is because of this that anything that bothers or children becomes the first problem for us. Diseases and illnesses are the one of the worst problems that we might face in terms of our children. Here I will try to discuss one of them known as Polio.

Polio, or more properly poliomyelitis, was one of the most feared and studied diseases of the first half of the 20th Century. The causative agent, a virus called poliovirus, lives in the throat and intestinal tract of infected persons. The virus enters the body through the mouth, usually from hands contaminated with the stool of an infected person. Objects, such as eating utensils, can also spread the virus. Food and water are not thought to play a major role in the spread of polio.

The polio virus attacks the nerve cells that control muscle movements. Many people infected with the virus have few or no symptoms. Others have short-term symptoms, such as headache, tiredness, fever, stiff neck and back, and muscle pain. More serious problems happen when the virus invades nerves in the brain and causes paralysis of the muscles used in swallowing and breathing. Invasion of the nerves in the spinal cord can cause paralysis of the arms, legs, or trunk.

As we mentioned before, Polio has most likely caused paralysis and even death for most of human history. The oldest clearly identifiable position to paralytic poliomyelitis is an Egyptian stele over 3,000 years old. With improvements in waste disposal and the widespread use of indoor plumbing in the 20th century, epidemics of polio began to occur with regularity in the developed world, primarily in cities during the summer. Because