Dr. Tom Murray, MD, PhD, Associate Professor of pediatric diseases and global health at the Yale School of Medicine, talks about a new surge of polio.
Interview conducted by Ivanhoe Broadcast News in October 2022.
What’s bringing polio back?
MURRAY: there’s one case that’s been reported in New York from someone who was unvaccinated and almost certainly had the vaccine strain, the oral vaccine strain as the cause of their polio. Unfortunately, what’s bringing it back is that there are pockets of unvaccinated individuals that allow the virus to cause infection when those individuals are exposed.
Are those younger adults or why do we have- is it vaccine hesitancy?
MURRAY: It can be vaccine hesitancy. It can be related to one’s own personal or religious beliefs. At the population level, we need about 80 percent of individuals to be vaccinated for herd immunity. And while we have that kind of across the entire population, there are areas where it’s less than 80 percent and those groups are at risk.
Can you explain the oral strain?
MURRAY: Currently in the United States, we use an inactivated polio vaccine. It’s a dead virus that we use to keep people safe. In many places around the world, they use a less virulent attenuated oral strain. That’s not right in many places. Many places around the world use an oral polio vaccine, which consists of an attenuated or less harmful strain of polio that people take orally to keep them safe. Rarely, that vaccine strain can cause disease which is why here in the United States we use an inactivated polio vaccine, which is dead virus.
Should parents be concerned about the case in New Yorkor is it just a rare case?
MURRAY: The short answer is that it’s likely to be a rare case. However, the other thing that’s gotten a lot of attention is polio in the wastewater. People are checking wastewater and that- and polio has been recovered in several different counties in New York and in London, and in many places, suggesting that there are people who have the polio virus but are not necessarily sick and coming to medical attention. It’s out there, but the way parents can keep themselves and their families safe is just to get vaccinated. The vaccine is highly effective. We’ve been using it for many years. For this particular virus as opposed to some of the other ones that we’ve had to deal with lately, the vaccine is a great way to protect your child, and then you don’t have to worry at all.
Is the polio vaccine part of that routine immunization schedule?
MURRAY: The inactivated polio vaccine is a routine child vaccine that we’ve been giving for many years. It starts at two months, and then it’s at four months, six months, age 4-6, and then one more in adolescence.
What causes the concern with polio?
MURRAY: The one effect that everyone gets really worried about, and it’s quite rare, but it can happen is paralysis and neurological disease. And unfortunately, when that happens, there really is no treatment and there is no cure. Once you’ve kind of gone down that road, it’s supportive care. And very rarely if you’re breathing muscles become paralyzed, it results in death. Again, these are very rare things, all completely preventable with vaccination.
Is there anything you want to add on?
MURRAY: One thing I would say in general is that we are seeing lots of different infections kind of pop up out of nowhere over the last couple of years, starting with the pandemic. Then as you mentioned, monkeypox and polio, you never know what’s going to come next. And as an example, measles is another vaccine-preventable disease that where we’ve seen some sporadic cases. The benefits of vaccination are tremendous. Sometimes we forget about those benefits because we haven’t seen those diseases in a while. Before the polio vaccine, polio was a very scary disease back in the ’40s, and I just can’t emphasize enough that the vaccines are safe and provide tremendous benefit.
END OF INTERVIEW
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