For Patients/Families

Polio
Polio is caused by a virus that enters the body through the intestinal tract and can extend into the blood stream. From the blood it enters, infects, and destroys the nerve cells of the spinal cord and brain stem (lower part of the brain). Paralysis and even death can result. Polio was a common, devastating disease causing life-long suffering until an effective vaccine was made widely available in the 1950s. Since then the number of polio cases has plummeted. The only polio seen now in the U.S. is associated with the oral, live virus vaccine.