In the book, Polio: An American Story, author David Oshinsky reexamines the steps of researchers in their search for the treatment and cure of polio. The first recorded polio epidemic in the Unites States of America occurred in 1894 in the rural country of Vermont. In the late spring of 1908, Karl Landsteiner, a researcher from Vienna who later in his career discovered the different types of human blood, isolated the virus by injecting an emulsion of spinal fluid from a young boy who had just died from the polio virus into monkeys. This experiment was a huge breakthrough for prevention of polio during the early twentieth century because it not only helped the fight of polio but tremendously helped in the battle against many deadly infectious …show more content…
The nation was stunned because they believed the that disease could only occur in the poor young children in the ghettos and Roosevelt was a wealthy 39 year old man. Roosevelt was a major influence in the search for a vaccine because he symbolized that life could continue for those that were disabled by the disease. He helped find and fund the March of Dimes, known as the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, which gave aid to victims and fund research in finding a cure for polio. In the year 1938, almost 2.7 million dimes were sent straight to the White House by the American people in support for that year’s campaign for March of the Dimes. Amazing …show more content…
He uses phrases like “did not work as well as I expected” to inject his opinion into the book. He focuses too much on the foolish disagreements and squabbles among researchers throughout the entire narrative. There were multiple arguments between the researchers on how to find the best way to treat and prevent the poliovirus. I would have loved to hear more about the science behind the live-virus and killed-virus vaccines. The book goes on about politics and not enough about science. Oshinsky did a poor job in spelling out the poliovirus’ cycle and transmission processes; and the reason I choose this book was to learn mostly about the science behind the poliovirus and how it affected people in America. He did not include the theories of early exposure of polio among the poor children in rural areas and ways to get immunity against the deadly disease. The photographs nicely distributed throughout the book nicely compliment the text and arguments in the book. The pictures evoke emotion because they show infected children in hospitals and all of them are in a monotone black and white