Anyone here remember the mass polio vaccination?

I remember loads of jabs in the 50s when I was a child, including polio. I was terrified of it after seeing a Danny Kaye film, the Five Pennies I think, where his daughter caught polio and was in an iron lung.

I had non-paralytic polio aged 8, I was very ill and in hospital in isolation for a week. Thankfully no paralysis.
Gave me a fear of hospitals and ambulances.

I recovered and forgot about it until an osteopath commented that despite appearances I had a fragile frame, I then said I had had this as a child which he thought it explained it. I occasionally think about it and before moving here had a conversation with the British Polio Society, who gave me good advice and said I was doing the right thing moving to southern France. This has reminded me to mention it to current osteopath who is the latest person to start to sort out artho dystrophy in my leg after a knee replacement eighteen months ago. Anyone out there had the same problem with knee?

I had what they called the primary disease of TB when my father had it and was in hospital for weeks. I was three, not ill but when it came to BCG vaccinations I reacted hugely and had a big scar on my arm after the injection for many years. the Heaf test pinpricks have only disappeared in recent year!

Chaitriona , always one with negativity!!

I had both polio vaccines. The reason being that shortly after I had my injection Hull was gripped by a massive polio outbreak and the oral vaccine was used there for the first time. I was quite narked because I'd just had the injection the year before. One thing I do know that differs with this mass vaccination, the whole of the population of Hull was vaccinated in a very short time, so the disease was stopped abruptly. I'm a bit worried about this system of vaccinating only a few then a few more.

My daughter had a mild dose of polio Fortunately with no ill effects. Her school friend was in an iron lung and her left arm was affected and didn’t grow any more.
I had the smallpox vaccination in the 1930s and it left a scar of rings three quarters of an inch across on my arm. Fortunately grew out over the years.

Great that others remember queing for this Salk jab.

Diptheria was a very frightening part of my infancy - so pleased when they managed to get out a vaccine against that.

When I had my own children, I was so pleased at the really wonderful vaccination programme, which took away so many of the past childhood illness worries.

I have my sleeve rolled up so that as soon as I am called, I will be there to present it for this latest vaccination, sending a heartfelt thanks to the wonderful scientists who invented it.

Children in Edinburgh were vaccinated en masse in the High Street. It was a long wait and I was scared. It did hurt but it was more the fear of the needle than the actual pain. The grandson of a neighbour was in callipers. It was more my mum than me that was terrified. Nancy Rioch was a Scottish swimming star who died and her very name seemed to have a mournful and dreadful ring to me. A friend has been paralysed all her life and uses a wheelchair. They realised she was paralysed as a baby when she couldn’t stand up from her potty. However vaccines can damage some people. They are not universally harmless. Particularly people with compromised immune systems are very vulnerable. But it can be unpredictable even in healthy people. Some types of vaccine are more dangerous than others. A friend lost her baby when he was given multiple vaccines at a time when he also had a snuffle. They don’t give these now. Some people here are too ready to cast scorn and contempt on anyone who voices concerns and call them idiots. Like many things vaccination has potential benefits and potential threats. There are also huge amounts of money to be made which always skews things.

I remember queuing for the polio injection with all our neighbours. My mum asked the nurse if I could have the jab in my right arm as I'm left handed. She refused!

My friend's older sister had polio and walked with a limp ever after. I remember having the jab around 1957. After seeing the pictures of children in iron lungs we never considered refusing it.

Aged 3 I was playing with a friend at close quarters as toddlers do. When she developed polio my mum had an anxious few weeks. The girl in question spent the rest of her life with metal splints on her legs.It was the sugar lump for me with mum watching me like a hawk to make sure I didn’t spit it out. It put me off sugar and sweet things for good.

Had all vaccinations as told to by my parents who trusted our Doctor! Had a horrible experience when one of the girls in our class contracted polio & we were taken to ‘cheer her up’ in hospital. We could not see or talk to her properly as she was in one of the scary iron lungs. Scared most of us stupid for weeks but knew most of us would not get it thanks to the vaccine. When/if my turn comes for this vaccine then I will be there in a flash. Anti Vaxxers are pathetic not trusting vaccines. A lot of them would not be here causing trouble spreading ridiculous rumours if not for all the successful vaccines already having been used!

When I started at the grammar school back in 1964, a girl in the 5th Form was in a wheelchair as a result of polio when younger.

We little ones looked upon her as a sort of What Katy Did character, the school entrance had steep steps, and the 6th Form boys used to help lift her wheelchair in. We thought it looked quite romantic and heroic somehow.

That was back in the day before disabled access, don’t know how she managed the stairs and steps, or the loo, as not much wheelchair room.

Yes, I had the smallpox jab in 1966, as I was going on holiday, and Switzerland, I think, insisted, although the cases had been in Glasgow, and we lived in
Kent.
I still have an unsightly scar on my arm, very irritating, tho smallpox would have been worse.

I was born in 1951 and I remember lots of ‘jabs’ as I grew up! I think I was given the sugar lump for polio. What a lucky generation we were being able to be inoculated against so many serious illnesses. I’m waiting patiently for my call up for the covid jab!

I remember the polio vaccine and I'm sure I had a booster when pregnant with my first child. A girl I worked with had had polio at the age of ten and was paralysed from the chest down. It never stopped her leading an almost normal life in spite of being in a wheelchair. She said she used to swim for her school and caught it from the pool.
I was quite groggy after the smallpox vaccine which turned into a horrible scab.
One vaccination I've never had was the BCG for TB. I really should have had it as TB claimed a couple of aunts but I missed the school vaccination programme.

I remember going for the polio vaccine with my big brothers and sister, but I was pre-school age so can’t remember too much. It was at our GP surgery.

I have good reason to remember the Polio vaccinations. Our parents were offered a choice - either the Canadian vaccine now (June) or the British version which would be available in the autumn. Mum and Dad discussed this - unfortunately my sister and I heard the discussion - all about that some children had died after having the Canadian one. They decided that we should have it rather than risk not being vaccinated before the Summer, when Polio was at its height.

I had the jab at school along with my class of 11 year olds. Returned to the classroom and came over all hot, faint and dizzy. The teacher mocked me as a feartie, told me to take my blazer off to cool down. I did and there was the arm of my blouse soaked in blood , still running down my arm. I was convinced I was going to die. This gave me a lifelong fear of blood tests and injections, bleeding of any kind with many instances of me passing out whenever someone approached me with a needle or even when my sister took a nose bleed on a bus and I passed out.

Second reason: my beloved husband contracted Polio when he was 17. He had been offered vaccination at college when it was rolled out to apprentices. His mother refused to give consent because she had read in the papers that some children had died. As a Queen's Scout he was selected to go as part of the Scottish Contingent to the Jubilee Jamboree at Sutton Coalfield - a gathering of thousands of Scouts from around the world. Came home, felt a bit rough and weak, saw GP who sent him to hospital, He went home on the bus! to tell his Mum and collect some PJ's then straight by ambulance to the 'fever' hospital. He was the last person in the County to be admitted there with Polio, which had been all but eradicated locally by the vaccination programme.

He was there for 3 months, his parents were not allowed in, could only wave to him from outside through a window. No physiotherapy was offered so he bought a drum kit, used that to build up the strength in his arms. His left arm remained weak for the rest of his life but he adapted and was a successful joiner and musician. Polio, for those that 'recover', is a life shortening illness, due to the extra pressure put on the heart, other muscles, etc. but he lived to be 80.

Did you know that thanks to Rotary International's vaccination programme, Polio has been eradicated in all parts of the World bar Pakistan and Afghanistan? and can you guess to whom our major donation in his memory went ?

My dad had polio and went from being very active and sporty to spending over a year in hospital (some of it in an Iron lung) so I have very positive views on vaccination. We were in quarantine and had to have the house fumigated, soft toys thrown out. The library refused to have their books back, the laundry would not accept our washing and some family friends refused to come near the house, preferring to shout from the end of the garden (sound familiar?). Dad lost the use of one leg and only had one functioning lung (he was a teacher in a village school and assumed he had contracted the disease from the use of the communal towel in the cloakroom). He reckoned that his illness was responsible for the introduction of paper towels in his school. I was one of the first to be vaccinated in our area and had no reaction but my older brother was vaccinated later and had a flu-like reaction. I had probably had a mild case of polio as I was only a toddler at the time and had spent a lot of time with my dad. Polio certainly had a major effect on all our lives and get very annoyed by the scares and alarms about vaccines.

I had polio as a very small child as a result of the vaccine. Nevertheless, I would always advocate the uptake of any vaccine that saves lives and eradicates horrible diseases.

I remember the polio vaccine and the small pox. I knew 2 people with with polio and they were both very disabled. The worst was anthrax vaccine I had a couple of times. I got a very red arm. I worked in a wool testing lab in Bradford and handled raw mohair, so we had to be vaccinated. I used to reckon if Sadam Hussain bombed us with anthrax it would be up to me to repopulate the planet!

Can definitely remember the polio vaccination. I know there were definitely two injections needed if not a third. Being young at the time can't recall any debate about whether or not to have it. As it affected mainly the young wonder how it would have been viewed to round them up and stick them somewhere to survive or not as happened with the elderly in the current pandemic.

When my oldest daughter had her first vaccines in 1976 we lived in Birmingham and I was given a polio booster. I later found out that as it was an area with a large number of immigrants from the Indian subcontinent most of whom hadn't been vaccinated it was a way of protecting them. I think the vaccine was a live one in those days

I had the polio vaccine in the fifties when I was at boarding school. No disposable needles then, we were done alphabetically and as my name began with P by the time it got to me, it was very painful! I had a sore arm for days

Gosh yes. And in Mauritius where I was brought up, we had epidemics approximately every 10 years. I had polio very mildly myself aged 18 months, before vaccines were available, so feel very blessed that it is now so accessible!

I was born in 1952 and had the polio vaccine as an injection at some point in the 1950s, can't remember exactly when. I remember watching Emergency Ward 10 on TV and all those patients in terrifying iron lungs.

In case we should ever forget ...