Milestones in Modern Science: The First Polio Vaccine

Product Description

In the first half of the twentieth century, the highly infectious virus poliomyelitis was responsible for crippling and sometimes killing thousands of children worldwide. With the controversial help of government funding the immunologist Jonas Salk eventually developed a successful vaccine against it, virtually eradicating the disease from the western world. The First Polio Vaccine explains what vaccinations are and how they work, discusses how Salk created his vaccine and how his work was received by his peers and the public, investigates how other scientists developed the polio vaccine, and takes a look at what his discovery has meant for medical science up to the present day.