Virtual Museum of Polio Survivors
Sources & References
The record behind the rooms
Every room in this museum rests on published historical and medical research. The texts draw on the standard scholarly accounts of the polio epidemics and the development of the vaccines, and on the current guidance of the World Health Organization, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Global Polio Eradication Initiative. The sources are listed below, room by room.
All images in this museum are AI-generated illustrations created for this project. They are not historical photographs, and they do not depict real individuals or documented events.
Room VI
The Day the Fear Ended
Covering the 1954 field trial, the announcement of 12 April 1955, the Salk and Sabin vaccines, the Cutter incident, the global eradication campaign, and the later lives of survivors.
Institutional sources
- World Health Organization Poliomyelitis — Fact Sheet
- World Health Organization Polio Vaccines — WHO Position Paper
- Global Polio Eradication Initiative Technical resources and surveillance data
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention History of Polio Vaccination
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention About Polio
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Polio Vaccination
Historical and medical literature
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Oshinsky, David M. Polio: An American Story. Oxford University Press, 2005. ISBN 978-0-19-515294-4.
The standard historical account of the American epidemics and the development of the vaccine.
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Offit, Paul A. The Cutter Incident: How America’s First Polio Vaccine Led to the Growing Vaccine Crisis. Yale University Press, 2005. ISBN 978-0-300-10864-4.
The definitive history of the Cutter incident and the reform of vaccine regulation that followed.
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Paul, John R. A History of Poliomyelitis. Yale University Press, 1971. ISBN 978-0-300-01260-6.
A classic reference written by one of the leading polio researchers of the twentieth century.
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Plotkin, Stanley A., Walter A. Orenstein and Paul A. Offit (eds.). Plotkin’s Vaccines. Elsevier, current edition.
The leading medical reference on vaccine development, immunology and immunisation programmes.
Original scientific publications
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Salk, Jonas E., et al. “Formaldehyde Treatment and Safety Testing of Experimental Poliomyelitis Vaccines.” American Journal of Public Health, 1954.
The primary publication describing the development of the inactivated poliovirus vaccine.
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Sabin, Albert B. “Oral Poliovirus Vaccine: History of Its Development and Use.” The Journal of Infectious Diseases, 1985.
Sabin’s own account of the development of the oral vaccine.
Archives
- University of Michigan School of Public Health The Polio Story Primary documents and contemporary material on the 1954 field trial, the announcement of 12 April 1955 and the public response.