Two polio vaccines are used throughout the world to combat polio. The first was invented by Jonas Salk and first tested in 1952 and announced to the world by Salk on April 12, 1955. It consists of an injected dose of killed polio virus. Thereafter, Albert Sabin produced an oral polio vaccine using live but weakened (attenuated) virus. Human trials of Sabin's vaccine began in 1957 and it was licensed in 1962.

When the live-virus Sabin vaccine was developed, it spread in popularity for several reasons. First, it can 'infect' other, non-vaccinated individuals with whom the vaccinated person has close contact and confer some immunity to them. Second, because the oral vaccine acts in the gut, it confers immunity there and reduces the spread of the wild virus. The injected vaccine, acting through the bloodstream, immunizes the individual but does not reduce his ability to spread the wild virus. Third, the live-virus vaccine is cheaper than the killed-virus vaccine. Finally, the oral vaccine is easier to administer than the injected vaccine, so patients are more likely to complete the vaccination series and attain full immunity. Though Salk's vaccine had reduced the incidence of polio to a tiny fraction of what it was in the early 1950s, Sabin's vaccine was considered superior for these reasons and became the standard treatment. The killed-virus vaccine immunized people against the effects of the virus, but the virus could still spread from person to person. It was the live-virus vaccine that enabled the complete eradication of the wild polio virus in the United States.

The major disadvantage of the live-virus vaccine is that it can itself cause sporadic cases of polio either from the vaccine itself or from the circulation of the vaccine. There is neither risk from the killed-virus vaccine.

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Check this video out -- UNICEF: Afghanistan is first country to use bivalent polio vaccine http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrJ0QXvVSeg
MelroyM (Melroy Mascarenhas) Fri, 18 Dec 2009 19:15:35 -0000
Check this video out -- UNICEF: Afghanistan is first country to use bivalent polio vaccine http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrJ0QXvVSeg
Check this video out -- UNICEF: Afghanistan is first to use bivalent polio vaccine http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=od5e3jkS0d4
MelroyM (Melroy Mascarenhas) Fri, 18 Dec 2009 18:29:40 -0000
Check this video out -- UNICEF: Afghanistan is first to use bivalent polio vaccine http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=od5e3jkS0d4
RT @UNICEF: Afghanistan: First country worldwide to use bivalent oral polio vaccine http://bit.ly/8k4wvU
mike1909 (Mihaela ) Fri, 18 Dec 2009 18:22:20 -0000
RT @UNICEF: Afghanistan: First country worldwide to use bivalent oral polio vaccine http://bit.ly/8k4wvU
Afghanistan is the first country to use bivalent oral polio vaccine http://bit.ly/6wFcGe Types 1 and 3; but type 2 is not eradicated
profvrr (Vincent Racaniello) Fri, 18 Dec 2009 16:42:20 -0000
Afghanistan is the first country to use bivalent oral polio vaccine http://bit.ly/6wFcGe Types 1 and 3; but type 2 is not eradicated
Afghanistan first in world to use new vaccine against polio http://tinyurl.com/ybgjugl
columdonnelly (Colum) Fri, 18 Dec 2009 10:34:49 -0000
Afghanistan first in world to use new vaccine against polio http://tinyurl.com/ybgjugl
UNICEF - Afghanistan - Afghanistan is the first country worldwide to use bivalent oral polio vaccine - http://bit.ly/6SHtBG
MelroyM (Melroy Mascarenhas) Fri, 18 Dec 2009 05:28:23 -0000
UNICEF - Afghanistan - Afghanistan is the first country worldwide to use bivalent oral polio vaccine - http://bit.ly/6SHtBG

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