THE CASE OF cVDPV2 REPORTED IN ROCKLAND COUNTY; NEW YORK has brought up a lot of discussion in national media about just what polio is anyway, as there are many folks out there who don’t know much about it, how it’s spread, it’s dangers and how to prevent it. Until the Rockland case, many thought that it was eradicated. A couple of well-known publications offer tutorials to help answer these questions. The first is from The Washington Post, which offers a slide show with a written narrative. It seems pretty accurate, except for a comment about the vaccine temperature not having to be maintained at a certain level, which it does. The “Cold Chain” for the polio vaccine is one of GPEI’s outstanding accomplishments. Click on the above link to view the slide show.
The other publication offering is from USA Today. It is a podcast, but they also published it as an article for those who would instead read than listening. It also answers many questions about how the polio case was discovered, the wastewater tested, and where we go from here. And, like the Washington Post story, it also has a few “Hiccups.” For instance, it refers to the first polio vaccine as the oral vaccine, developed in 1955 by Jonas Salk. It was the injectable vaccine he created in 1955, followed by Albert Sabin’s oral vaccine in 1961. It also does not fully explain how, in rare instances, the oral vaccine can mutate back to full strength and infect an unimmunized child. But I include it in this newsletter because it answers many questions that I’m sure folks wonder about and provides a good narrative about the sequence of events, questions about school vaccination requirements, etc., surrounding this case. Click on the above link to access the podcast and article. A Third online publication, not as well-known as the above organizations, is “Your Local Epidemiologist,” a newsletter published by Katelyn Jetelina, MPH Ph.D., an epidemiologist and biostatistician with the University of Texas. She was recently invited to the White House to participate in discussions about pandemic preparedness in the U.S. and across the globe. In July, Judy Woodruff was interviewed on the PBS Newshour about Covid-19 and Monkeypox. In her latest newsletter, she talks about not only Covid-19 and Monkeypox but also Polio, where she offers a detailed breakdown of the vaccination situation in New York City. Click on the link above for the newsletter, published today (Monday, August 22nd).
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