Anyone growing up in the 40's or 50's would probably have known someone who had polio - a crippling and potentially deadly infectious disease which spreads from person to person and can invade an infected person's brain and spinal cord, causing paralysis.
In some cases the virus affected the muscles that helped sufferers breathe. In 1928 a device known as the iron lung was developed by Philip Drinker and Louie Shaw. This device would be placed over a patient's body to take over their breathing. Most patients would spend around two weeks in the device but many polio survivors with permanent respiratory paralysis continually use modern jacket-type ventilators that are worn over the chest and abdomen.
According to the Guinness Book of records, June Middleton from Melbourne Australia spent the longest time in an iron lung. She began using the device after contracting the disease at the age of 22 and continued using it for 60 years until her death aged 83.
In 1954 the first polio vaccine was developed in the USA by Dr Jonas Salk.
A group of children from Arsenal Elementary School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, received the first injections of the new vaccine in 1955. The oral polio vaccine which is the one most commonly used today was developed by Albert Sabin a Polish American medical researcher and came into commercial use in 1961. On May 1 1956 the first ever polio vaccine was made available to the British and a national immunisation programme began.
Children aged between two and nine were given the serum in a bid to eradicate the disease that had crippled thousands, including TV's Mary Berry.
In 1988 the polio virus was present in more than 125 countries and paralysed 350,000 people every year, primarily young children. The World Health Assembly set a goal to eliminate the disease, and the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) began. This is a public-private partnership led by national governments and spearheaded by the World Health Organization (WHO), the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF),the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Rotary International. Since the initiative was launched, immunization efforts have reduced the number of cases by more than 99% saving an estimated 13 million children from paralysis. Today polio is only found in Pakistan and Afghanistan with fewer than 100 cases being reported in 2015 and it is hoped to eradicate the disease altogether by 2019.
In 1985, Rotary launched its PolioPlus program, the first initiative to tackle global polio eradication through the mass vaccination of children.
Rotary International also initiated World Polio Day which is observed on October 24 each year in order to commemorate the birth of Jonas Salk. To date Rotary initiative has raised in the region of $1.6 billion.
Almancil International Rotary Club (AIRC) wanted to do its part and on Sunday 23rd October a group of Rotarians and friends set off on a 7.5 kilometre walk around the Ria Formosa to raise funds for the campaign. The group was joined by young people from the Quarteira Rotary Interact Club with Personal Trainers Algarve submitting the group to warm up exercises before the walk and winding them down afterwards .
"We are a club which likes to support local causes" said AIRC President Hermes Alberto "but eradicating polio helps everyone so we are happy to make our contribution. This year we raised 500 euros which will be sent to the Rotary Foundation. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation triples every donation made to the End Polio Now campaign so our small contribution will turn into 1,500 euros"
