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Life & leadership lessons we can learn from FD Roosevelt, Dr. Salk & the eradication of polio in the US, from Doug Keeley’s “Mark of a Leader” e-zine:

Poliomyelitis – Polio – is an infectious, viral disease which has been around since ancient times. Its effects are devastating. Polio attacks the nerve cells and sometimes the central nervous system, often causing muscle wasting, paralysis and even death. Highly contagious and affecting mostly the young, polio epidemics tend to happen during the summer months.

In 1921, the disease struck an especially prominent US citizen: 39-year old vice-presidential candidate Franklin Delano Roosevelt. After contracting a sudden fever and chills, Roosevelt lost the use of both of his legs. He would spend the rest of his life in a wheelchair.

After becoming President, Roosevelt founded a charity known as the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, dedicated to polio research. But with America just coming out of the worst economic depression it had ever weathered, traditional sources of charity funds had dried up.

So instead of going after big donations, the Foundation appealed to everyone in America to send in a small amount. The message: no one was too poor to give a dime to help a kid walk again! Roosevelt himself helped launch the appeal with a radio broadcast, and within days the White House had received almost 3 million letters, each containing a donation.

The organization and its new way of fundraising ultimately became The March of Dimes – millions of people giving what they could, even if it was a dime.

Inspired by FDR, movie stars and celebrities gave the time and names to the cause to raise its profile. It worked brilliantly. By the late 1940’s, the foundation was raising an unprecedented $22M per year. The fight against polio had become a national crusade.

Yet they were no closer to having a viable vaccine. Until in 1951, the head of the foundation, Basil O’Connor, met a research scientist from the University of Pittsburgh: Dr. Jonas Salk. They hit it off immediately, and Salk agreed to head up a massive research effort.

Up until that point, researchers had focused on making vaccines from live virus. The live virus would be crippled so that it could not develop further, but would trigger the immune system to create antibodies. This was felt to be the only valid and safe approach; but it was a complex and very time-consuming process.

Salk was a brilliant and ambitious scientist whose experience working with flu vaccines told him a killed-virus vaccine would be possible, and much faster to produce. Other scientists criticized Salk’s methods, insisting that the only way a safe vaccine could be developed was from live virus… but that it was still 5-10 years away.

Salk knew that was far too long to wait. New cases were appearing every day, and children were dying or being paralyzed. For worried families across the country, every second counted.

By 1952 America was experiencing its worst polio epidemic. Nearly 58,000 cases were reported, leaving over 21,000 young people with some form of paralysis for the rest of their lives. The only way some of them could continue to breathe was by spending their lives encased in a metal prison known as an “iron lung”. Surveys at the time showed that, apart from the atomic bomb, polio was Americans’ greatest fear.

With the support of March of Dimes, Salk completed the animal testing phase and was ready to test the vaccine on humans. In November 1953, at a press conference in New York, Salk announced that his wife and sons had been among the first volunteers to be vaccinated. More importantly: the volunteers had all produced antibodies, and none got sick.

The field trial to test the vaccine was the largest and most elaborate program of its kind, involving 20,000 physicians and public health personnel, 220,000 volunteers and 1.8 million school children. Polls showed that more people knew about the field trials than knew the name of the President.

It was the largest human experiment in American history… but the public would have to wait for nearly a year to learn the results.

Finally, on April 12, 1955, the announcement was made to a live audience of over 500 people, and a broadcast audience that included 54,000 physicians sitting in movie theaters across the country. The trials had been a success!

Americans everywhere listened intently to their radios for the details; church bells rang out, factory whistles blew, department stores broadcast the news across their PA systems, and every newspaper in the country ran huge headlines trumpeting the news. Laboratories began preparing millions of doses for distribution.

Jonas Salk became a beloved national celebrity overnight, and was showered with awards. When asked who owned the patent, he replied, “There is no patent. Could you patent the sun?”

The success of the vaccination program was both dramatic, and rapid.

In 1955 there were 28,985 reported cases of polio; the following year, that dropped to 14,647. By 1957, there were fewer than 6,000 …and by 1961, only 161 cases. Polio, once one of America’s most feared diseases, became largely a thing of the past.

Jonas Salk continued to work in the field of immunology, trying to develop vaccines against cancer and AIDS until his death in 1995.

What can we learn from his story?

Believe in yourself. Salk was criticized as being “unscientific” for his approach. But he believed in himself to the point that the first trial vaccines were given to his own family to show that they were safe!

Sometimes fast beats perfect. Salk knew that his method wasn’t the only way to create a vaccine… but he also knew that by using it, he could cut development time significantly. And that would make all the difference. For the worried parents who were counting on him to protect their children, that speed was absolutely essential.

Everyone doing a little adds up to a lot. When the success of the Salk vaccine was announced, it was rightly seen as a “victory for the whole nation”. It had not been funded by giant corporations, wealthy benefactors or federal treasuries. It happened through the efforts of millions of volunteers, and hundreds of millions of people who gave what they could – even a dime – to make a difference.

Most great leaders would be content to leave one strong mark. Salk left us two.

First, the cure for polio.

And second, the millions of families who continue to be helped by the charity that funded the polio cure – the incredible March of Dimes.

On behalf of all of those families around the world – thank you Dr. Salk.