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1949: Polio epidemic hits Northern Canada

Broadcast Date: March 7, 1949

Polio, a devastating disease that preys on young people around the world, has spread its tendrils into the most remote regions of Canada. The paralyzing illness, which has shut down schools, churches and theatres across the country, has now reached the shores of Hudson's Bay. As we hear in this 1949 CBC Radio clip, 13 aboriginal people ("Eskimos" in the terminology of the day) with polio symptoms are being flown to Winnipeg — their best hope for receiving treatment and surviving the disease.

1949: Polio epidemic hits Northern Canada

• Poliomyelitis, also known as infantile paralysis, is an infectious disease that has been around since ancient times. The disease causes paralysis, deformed limbs and in the most severe cases, death by asphyxiation. It is caused by a virus that thrives in unclean water.
• There is still no cure for polio. You can learn more about the fight against polio in the CBC Archives topic Polio: Combating the Crippler.

• In severe cases, polio patients were placed inside an iron lung, a medieval-looking contraption that forces air in and out of the lungs. The patient's entire body, except the head, was sealed inside these metal respirators, sometimes for months at a time. Polio survivors had to endure awkward braces and painful exercises, and were sometimes left with permanent disabilities.
• According to official statistics from years 1927 to 1962, 50,000 Canadians were infected with the polio virus. Of those, 4,700 died.

• In Canada, polio was so feared that as recently as the 1950s, it closed schools, emptied streets and banned children under 16 from entering churches and theatres. Victims were often quarantined under the mistaken impression that anything they touched might be contaminated. Some neighbourhoods were even sprayed with the toxic (and later banned) pesticide DDT.

• In the summer of 1921, polio struck future U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt. It happened on Campobello Island, New Brunswick, where the Roosevelts kept a summer home. FDR, then 39, nearly died in Canada when officials initially refused to admit him back into the U.S. because of the disease. Polio crippled Roosevelt's legs.

• In the mid-1950s, American scientist Jonas Salk field-tested a polio vaccine on 1,830,000 school children in the U.S., Canada and Finland. It was the largest medical experiment ever undertaken, and the vaccine proved to be 60 to 90 per cent effective in preventing polio. Canada led the world in inoculating children using the Salk vaccine. The last major outbreak of polio in Canada was in 1959.

• Famous Canadians who had polio include prime ministers Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin, impresario Garth Drabinsky, singer Joni Mitchell, Haida artist Bill Reid, actor Donald Sutherland and rocker Neil Young.
• Polio was officially eradicated from North America in 1964. In 1988, the World Health Organization launched the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, a massive international effort to rid the world of polio.

• By 2003, polio had been eliminated from all but five countries (Nigeria, Pakistan, Niger, Afghanistan and Egypt). Only 414 children were paralyzed that year.

• In February 2006, it was announced that Egypt and Niger had reported no indigenous polio virus in the past 12 months.

• Chesterfield Inlet, the polio site mentioned in this 1949 clip, is a hamlet located on a small bay on the west shore of Hudson's Bay in Nunavut. Despite its northern landscape and climate, it is actually very close to the geographic centre of Canada. According to Statistics Canada, as of 2001, it was home to 345 people, 320 of which were identified as aboriginal.

Also on March 7:
• 1800: Philemon Wright founds Hull, Quebec. He named it after Kingston-upon-Hull in England.
• 1876: Alexander Graham Bell receives a U.S. patent for the telephone.
• 1965: Roman Catholic churches in Canada officially celebrate Mass in English, instead of Latin.

1949: Polio epidemic hits Northern Canada

Medium: Radio

Program: CBC News Roundup

Broadcast Date: March 7, 1949

Guest(s): W.J. Wood

Reporter: Thom Benson

Duration: 3:15

Last updated:
Oct. 1, 2008