A tribute to the school children who showed the Salk vaccine was safe
Under intense public pressure, the leaders at the NFIP — later known as the March of Dimes — were determined to launch an unprecedented school-based, million person nationwide trial of Salk’s vaccine before the onset of the next seasonal epidemic, expected in the summer of 1954. Salk’s earlier plans to “move cautiously … step by step,” however genuine, were jettisoned.
In less than a year, the Salk team needed to standardize methods, expand cell cultures and grow and then inactivate large quantities of virus. At the same time, there were issues of staffing, logistics, pharmaceutical manufacturing of vaccines and coordination with federal authorities to be dealt with. It became the “Warp Speed” vaccine project of its day.
One step that could not be omitted before moving into a million-child study was additional testing of the new experimental vaccine — that is, expanding the number of trial subjects to at least a few thousand. To achieve this, Salk turned to the local Pittsburgh and Allegheny County
schools, and they responded.
In early 1954, more than 40 Pittsburgh-area elementary schools sent letters signed by Salk to parents, explaining the study and inviting them to fill out and sign a consent form. Vaccinations began at the Arsenal School in Lawrenceville, and soon more than 7,500 local children were enrolled
and vaccinated. On April 24 of that year, based on the early results from the Pittsburgh and Allegheny County schools, Salk was able to report to the NFIP that the vaccine was safe. Two days later, the 1954 NFIP nationwide Polio Vaccine Field Trial was officially launched.
The 1954 NFIP nationwide field trial was the largest clinical trial ever done in the United States. It involved 1.8 million first, second and third graders in 211 study areas across 44 states, each of whom was awarded “Polio Pioneer” lapel pin, and more than 300,000 nurses, doctors, teachers, school officials, public health officials and lay citizens who cooperated in the effort. Volunteers administered the vaccine in the spring, and waited for the expected summer wave of polio infections to see if it worked.
The results were unequivocal: The Salk vaccine provided excellent protection against the paralytic forms of polio. On the day the results were announced, church bells rang out across America. The inactivated polio vaccine was promptly approved for general use across the country.
Years later the “Sabin-type” live attenuated oral polio vaccine replaced the “Salk-type” killed virus injected vaccine, but the United States later switched back due to the superior safety profile of the “Salk-type” vaccines. Now every year about ten million doses of the Salk-type inactivated polio vaccine are given to American children.
And around the world, through use of both vaccine types, wild polio has almost been eradicated.
Here in Pittsburgh we are justifiably proud that a team at the University of Pittsburgh, led by Jonas Salk, developed the first polio vaccine. But the nation — and indeed the world — still owes an unrecognized debt of gratitude to the unsung heroes of this story: the Pittsburgh-area school children who participated in the crucial 1953-1954 Salk polio vaccine studies, which paved the way for the nationwide field trial. They were the Polio Pre-Pioneers.
Seven decades later, let’s take a moment to thank these young trial participants — now all in their late 70s or early 80s. They remind us of the power of community action, and of what can be accomplished when we all work together for a common good.