You all become authorities on everything. First, no museum guide would ever say....now you are saying that you know what every scientist and doctor in the country was saying about polio. And no....my recollection is not a false memory. We DID have to stay indoors and not go out. There was a fear in the country of this very thing. So please, don't assume that you can talk for all--I don't care how old you are.
We do when we spend a great deal of time and effort educating ourselves, yes.
First, no museum guide would ever say....
That's right, they wouldn't (not counting the "Creationist Museums", which misrepresent actual science). Newsgatherer was fabricating false stories.
now you are saying that you know what every scientist and doctor in the country was saying about polio.
That's not what he said, try reading it again.
And no....my recollection is not a false memory. We DID have to stay indoors and not go out.
Because Polio is contagious. Duh. When you stay indoors, you avoid other people who may transmit it to you.
There was a fear in the country of this very thing.
Fear of leaving the house when Polio was rampant. Sure. But not for the reason you claimed in your earlier post. Please support your claim that "scientists" within your lifetime stated that "polio comes out of the ground". Feel free to cite any historical book, document, or other contemporaneous account you choose.
I strongly suspect that you're either misremembering, or you (or your mother) had original misheard/misunderstood, doctors using the euphemism of "soil" for "feces". (As in the phrase, "to soil yourself".) This euphemism was even more common half a century ago, which would make it a likely expression back in your youth, when doctors would have (correctly) warned people to avoid "soiled" items (including baby diapers) and other sources of fecal contamination, since that's the primary means by which polio is transmitted.
You or your mother may well have misunderstood a warning about Polio being found in "soil" (i.e. feces) as meaning in "dirt" (i.e. "in the ground").
Or, in areas without modern flush toilets, doctors may indeed have warned (correctly) that the ground and/or groundwater may be contaminated with infected fecal material. If so, this is hardly a good example for you to use to try to ridicule scientists, since that would have been (and still remains) *valid* advice.
This memory is correct. Public swimming pools were closed and people were indeed fearful. I don't believe there has ever been a comparable state of fear in this country, not even after 911.
What you lied about was the state of science. I know exactly what scientists were saying because my father was in charge of relaying the scientific position to the people of the state most affected by the polio epidemic.
Science knew what the disease was and how it spread. What they didn't know, prior to Salk, was how to protect children except by self-quarantine.
Polio was also the first epidemic disease of the rich. Most previous epidemics were weighted against the poor. You might remember a wealthy future president who was paralyzed by polio. There are some theories that suggest exactly the opposite of what you have claimed. They claim that poor hygiene (dirt) toughens up a child's immune system and is, in the long run, useful. It was noted that India had no paralytic polio.
Another little known nugget is that the Salk vaccine was a public health failure. Every single person had to have a shot, and everyone had to have a booster shot every year. I personally had four.
This seemed to protect those who got the shots, but it didn't stop the epidemic. The epidemic wasn't stopped until the live vaccine was used, and it worked because, like the disease, it spread itself.