In 1956 Elvis Presley Got a Polio Vaccination on National TV

On October 28, 1956, Elvis Presley, the “King of Rock and Roll” got a polio vaccine on TV. This led to a huge increase in the number of vaccinations (and a huge decline in death and disability).

In the 1950s polio was the biggest threat to children around the globe. In America alone, the virus infected more than 60.000 children, with around 3000 deaths. Many of the ones that did survive would be paralyzed for life, some forced to live inside of ‘iron lungs’ after their body lost the ability to breathe on it’s own.

Even though children were the most likely to contract the virus, adults weren’t safe either. everyone was susceptible to polio and it’s life-long complications. Even president Franklin D. Roosevelt, who served as President of the United States from 1933 to 1945.

The polio vaccine was developed in 1955, with widespread vaccinations throughout the US following immediately after. Most of the recipients were children, with most teens and adults opting out of the vaccination. This was a problem, for a population is at its safest when there is herd immunity, and the lack of vaccinations among certain ages left many more people at risk.

This is when Elvis Presley was asked if he could get his vaccine on live TV and in front of photographers to persuade young adults to get vaccinated as well. He readily agreed, resulting in a massive increase of immunization levels due to his popularity.

Polio rates continued to drop in later years. With the amount of American polio-related deaths having declined over 90% in just four years. Later, in 1979, polio was declared eradicated throughout the entire country.

The Terrible Tale of of Mary Mallon, Better Known as ‘Typhoid Mary’, the First Identified Typhoid Carrier in the United States

Mary Mallon, who became known as ‘Typhoid Mary,’ was identified circa 1907 as the controversial “patient zero” in a typhoid fever outbreak in the United States in the early 1900s. Although she never had symptoms, she was forced into quarantine on two occasions, for a total of 26 years.

Mary Mallon (foreground) didn’t show symptoms of typhoid, but spread the disease while working as a cook in the New York City area. She is pictured after having been institutionalized in a hospital on North Brother Island, where she stayed for more than a quarter century. (Bettmann/Getty Images)

Mary Mallon was born on September 23rd, 1869 in Cookstown, Ireland. Little is known about her early life, but she is known to have emigrated to the United States in either 1883 or 1884. Like the majority of Irish immigrants at that time she initially found work as a domestic servant. With time it became apparent that she had a talent for cooking, and around 1900 Mallon started to work as a cook for affluent families in the New York area.

From 1900 to 1907, Mallon worked as a cook in the New York City area for seven families. In 1900, she worked in Mamaroneck, New York, where, within two weeks of her employment, residents developed typhoid fever. In 1901, she moved to Manhattan, where members of the family for whom she worked developed fevers and diarrhea, and the laundress died. Mallon then went to work for a lawyer and left after seven of the eight people in that household became ill.

In August 1906, Mallon took a position in Oyster Bay, Long Island, and within two weeks 10 of the 11 family members were hospitalized with typhoid. She changed jobs again, and similar occurrences happened in three more households. She worked as a cook for the family of a wealthy New York banker, Charles Henry Warren. When the Warrens rented a house in Oyster Bay for the summer of 1906, Mallon went along, too. From August 27 to September 3, six of the 11 people in the family came down with typhoid fever. The disease at that time was “unusual” in Oyster Bay, according to three medical doctors who practiced there. Mallon was subsequently hired by other families, and outbreaks followed her.


Investigation

In late 1906, one family hired a typhoid researcher named George Soper to investigate. Soper published the results on June 15, 1907, in the Journal of the American Medical Association. He believed Mallon might have been the source of the outbreak. He wrote:

“It was found that the family changed cooks on August 4. This was about three weeks before the typhoid epidemic broke out. The new cook, Mallon, remained in the family only a short time and left about three weeks after the outbreak occurred. Mallon was described as an Irish woman about 40 years of age, tall, heavy, single. She seemed to be in perfect health.”

Soper discovered that a female Irish cook, who fit the physical description he was given, was involved in all of the outbreaks. He was unable to locate her because she generally left after an outbreak began, without giving a forwarding address. Soper learned of an active outbreak in a penthouse on Park Avenue and discovered Mallon was the cook. Two of the household’s servants were hospitalized, and the daughter of the family died of typhoid.

When Soper approached Mallon about her possible role in spreading typhoid, she adamantly rejected his request for urine and stool samples. Since Mallon refused to give samples, he decided to compile a five-year history of Mallon’s employment. Soper found that of the eight families that hired Mallon as a cook, members of seven claimed to have contracted typhoid fever. On his next visit, he took another doctor with him but again was turned away. During a later encounter when Mallon was herself hospitalized, he told her he would write a book and give her all the royalties. She angrily rejected his proposal and locked herself in the bathroom until he left.


First quarantine (1907–1910)

The New York City Health Inspector determined she was a carrier. Under sections 1169 and 1170 of the Greater New York Charter, Mallon was held in isolation for three years at a clinic located on North Brother Island.

In prison, she was forced to give stool and urine samples. Authorities suggested removing her gallbladder because they believed typhoid bacteria resided there. However, she refused as she did not believe she carried the disease. She was also unwilling to cease working as a cook.

Mallon attracted so much media attention that she was called “Typhoid Mary” in a 1908 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association. Later, in a textbook that defined typhoid fever, she was again called “Typhoid Mary.”

In a New York American article on 20 June 1910 she was branded ‘Typhoid Mary’ with a capital T and depicted in a sketch, skulls forming in her breath. Mallon did work in other posts, as a laundress, for example, but it was well known that the pay for a cook was far higher, so her return to cooking is understandable.

Eventually, Eugene H. Porter, the New York State Commissioner of Health, decided that disease carriers should no longer be kept in isolation and that Mallon could be freed if she agreed to stop working as a cook and take reasonable steps to prevent transmitting typhoid to others. On February 19, 1910, Mallon agreed that she was “prepared to change her occupation (that of a cook), and would give assurance by affidavit that she would upon her release take such hygienic precautions as would protect those with whom she came in contact, from infection.” She was released from quarantine and returned to the mainland.


Release and second quarantine (1915–1938)

Upon her release, Mallon was given a job as a laundress, which paid less than cooking. After several unsuccessful years of working as a laundress, she changed her name to Mary Brown and returned to her former occupation despite having been explicitly instructed not to. For the next five years, she worked in a number of kitchens; wherever she worked, there were outbreaks of typhoid. However, she changed jobs frequently, and Soper was unable to find her.

Mallon (fourth from right) was quarantined with other inmates for more than a third of her life. It’s likely that Mallon never fully understood how typhoid spread. In two separate outbreaks, she is estimated to have infected 51 people, three of whom died. (Sience History Images/Alamy)

In 1915, Mallon started another major outbreak, this time at Sloane Hospital for Women in New York City. Twenty-five people were infected, and two died. She again left, but the police were able to find and arrest her when she took food to a friend on Long Island. After arresting her, public health authorities returned her to quarantine on North Brother Island on March 27, 1915. She was still unwilling to have her gallbladder removed.

Mallon remained confined for the remainder of her life. She became a minor celebrity and was occasionally interviewed by the media. They were told not to accept even water from her. Later, she was allowed to work as a technician in the island’s laboratory, washing bottles.

Mary Mallon (wearing glasses) photographed with bacteriologist Emma Sherman on North Brother Island in 1931 or 1932, over 15 years after she had been quarantined there permanently.

Mallon spent the rest of her life in quarantine at the Riverside Hospital. Six years before her death, she was paralyzed by a stroke. On November 11, 1938, she died of pneumonia at age 69.

A post-mortem found evidence of live typhoid bacteria in her gallbladder. George Soper wrote however, “There was no autopsy,” a claim cited by other researcher to assert a conspiracy to calm public opinion after her death. Mallon’s body was cremated, and her ashes were buried at Saint Raymond’s Cemetery in the Bronx.

In 1918 People Made Some Tiny Flu Masks for Their Beloved Pets

These photos were taken during the 1918 Spanish Flu epidemic when someone need to protect their pets from the global flu pandemic too.

18 Gorgeous Vintage Public Health Posters From the 1930s and 1940s

From 1936–1943 the Federal Art Project under the Works Progress Administration (WPA) commissioned over 200,000 works from American artists and artisans in order to support struggling creatives.

Posters were designed to publicize exhibits, community activities, theatrical productions, and health and educational programs in seventeen states and the District of Columbia. The Federal Art Project was of one of the first U.S. Government programs to support the arts.

It is estimated that the WPA poster division printed about 2 million posters, most of which were subsequently lost or destroyed. Of the remaining originals, the Library of Congress keeps the largest collection of these posters, which include a variety of PSAs covering topics ranging from warnings about dog bites to encouraging vaccinations.

Poster showing a woman and two children in the rain: A lifelong job––the constant protection of their health––The Cook County Public Health Unit / E.S. Reid. Created between 1936 and 1941.

Poster for Cleveland Division of Health promoting swimming as healthy exercise, showing a man and a woman in a swimming pool. Created in 1940.

Poster promoting better health care through the prevention of tuberculosis by better eating and sleeping habits, and more exposure to sunshine. Created between 1936 and 1941.

Poster promoting good oral hygiene, showing stylized face, toothbrush and toothpaste. Created between 1936 and 1938.

Poster for the Cleveland Division of Health encouraging dog bite victims to report dog bites to the proper authorities, showing dog and injured hand. Created in 1941.

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20 Vintage Photos Captured People Gargling to Against the Flu From the Early 20th Century

The flu arrived as a great war raged in Europe, a conflict that would leave about 20 million people dead over four years.

In 1918, the flu would kill more than twice that number – and perhaps five times as many – in just 15 months. Though mostly forgotten, it has been called “the greatest medical holocaust in history.”

Experts believe between 50 and 100 million people were killed. More than two-thirds of them died in a single 10-week period in the autumn of 1918.

Never have so many died so swiftly from a single disease. In the United States alone, it killed about 675,000 in about a year – the same number who have died of AIDS in nearly 40 years.

As the country muddles through a particularly nasty flu season – one that the Centers for Disease Control says has killed 24 children in the first three weeks of January and 37 since the start of the flu season – the 1918 nightmare serves a reminder. If a virulent enough strain were to emerge again, a century of modern medicine might not save millions from dying.

As protection against the influenza virus, here are 20 vintage pictures of people are seen gargling with salt and water after a day spent working.

Practicing gargling at the spa resort of the Allier, Vichy, France, ca. 1915.

As protection against the influenza virus, men are seen gargling with salt and water after a day spent working in the War Garden at Camp Dix, New Jersey, September 1918. This was a preventative measure against the influenza epidemic that had spread to army camps.

Children at Sneed Road school gargling as a defense against influenza, 1931.

Staff at the Mutual Property Insurance Co., in London, gargling under the supervision of a trained nurse, teaching the staff to safeguard themselves from influenza, 1932. Hygienic paper cups are used and tablets are also provided.

Sailors from the training ship ‘Warspite’ gargling to prevent flu, 1933.

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6 Feet Covers: Duo Artists Re-Designed Iconic Album Covers to Promote Social Distancing

L.A. artists Paco Conde and Beto Fernandez have redesigned a series of album covers to raise awareness about the importance of staying at least 6 feet away from each other, to stop the spread of Coronavirus.

Social distancing is the new normal and it will be for a while. 6 feet or 1.8 meters is the distance that experts recommend we keep between each other.

The project, called ‘6 Feet Covers’, features iconic artwork including The Beatles’ Abbey Road cover and Blondie’s 1976 debut album.

Paco told BuzzFeed the idea came about last week when he noticed people in line at the supermarket not respecting the six-foot social distancing rule.

“We thought it’d be helpful and easy for everyone to understand if we used something from pop culture, and finally decided album covers would be a simple visual solution.”

1. The Beatles – Abbey Road (1969)

2. Queen – Queen II (1974)

3. Blondie – Blondie (1976)

4. U2 – The Joshua Tree (1987)

5. N.W.A. – Straight Outta Compton (1988)

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Flu Mask of the Future, 1919

In 1919, a woman wears what was most likely considered the “flu mask of the future” — a contraption bizarrely elephantine in appearance — so comfortable you can read while wearing it!

Wearing a mask to help prevent flu, but it was not known then that most infection was spread via the hands.

In 1918-1919, an epidemic of “Spanish Flu” spread around the world. At least 20 million died, although some estimates put the final toll at 50 million. It’s estimated that between 20 per cent and 40 per cent of the entire world’s population became sick.

(Photos: Topical Press Agency/Getty Images)

Haunting Colorized Photos Reveal the Devastation Caused by the Spanish Flu Which Killed at Least Fifty-Million

These seldom seen photographs, colorized for the first time, graphically depict the scale of the pandemic. The images reveal how doctors and nurses fought to save Spanish Flu sufferers in 1918. They show community centers and sports halls in the US converted into makeshift hospitals for the sick, while cinemas were closed and people wore face masks when they went to the park or took public transport.

“I have been colorizing for a long time as a hobby, which I started by coloring pictures for my family and friends, but my passion has grown into almost an obsession,” the colorizer, who wishes to remain anonymous, said in an interview. “It’s been over one-hundred years since the Spanish flu happened and I thought it was important to remember the millions of people who lost their lives.”

The disease, which broke out after the First World War, spread quickly and ravaged the globe, claiming between 20 million and 50 million lives.

A Kansas hospital during the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 that still lives large in people’s imaginations.

Hospital beds crammed head to toe at the San Francisco Naval Training Station. They are occupied by soldiers.

Theatres and public spaces were shut down to help prevent the virus spreading in the Spanish flu outbreak in 1918.

A mask is worn by a street sweeper in New York in 1918. The admonition of the New York Health Board to wear masks to check the spread of influenza epidemic was: ‘Better ridiculous than dead’.

A conductor checks to see if potential passengers are wearing required masks in Seattle, 1918.

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Vintage Photos Show How Infectious Diseases Were Dealt With in the Past

People around the world are avoiding traveling abroad, staying clear of hospitals and sporting face masks on a daily basis. But, this is not the first time an infectious disease caused society to take extra precautions. From tuberculosis to polio, the 20th century was filled with several health outbreaks. Take a look at how people avoided getting sick from diseases in the past.

1. Catching Colds

(Getty Images)

In 1932, doctors around London advised citizens to wear masks over their mouths in order to combat the spread of the flu. After coming to the understanding that influenza ‘germs’ were spreading from the mouth by speaking and coughing, people began sporting this cotton-ball like mouthguard.


2. Pool Protocol

(Getty Images)

Just before World War II broke out, British residents were warned that the next conflict would include chemical warfare. In order to protect themselves from the effects of gas bombs, which could lead to respiratory diseases, people walked around in gas masks. This pre-war family is seen sporting gas masks while heading to the Empire Pool in Wembley, London.


3. Kissing Precaution

(Getty Images)

When we see a cute baby in a stroller, some of us get a sudden urge to take a closer look and even reach in and give them a kiss. However, back in 1939, that kissing-urge led to the spread of the flu. Parents went so far as to place a warning sign on their adorable kids that read: Flu Precaution Please Don’t Kiss Me.


4. Healing Hayfever

(Getty Images)

In 1955, doctors created a mask to help hayfever sufferers. According to reports, air pressure from the lungs converted into an electrical current which created an ‘electrical pattern’. This helped doctors determine how each hayfever sufferer responded to the pollen.

(This original article was written by Noam Schulman and published on Ynetnews)

Instructions on How to Prevent the Spread of Influenza From 1918

Instructions on how to prevent the spread of influenza, published in a warning published by the Illustrated Current News in October 1918 when the pandemic first began to spread.

Poster of Red Cross nurse with a gauze mask over her nose and mouth, published by the Illustrated Current News (New Haven, Connecticut) in October 1918, the height of the influenza pandemic. (Image: US National Library of Medicine)

• Do not take any person’s breath.
• Keep the mouth and teeth clean.
• Avoid those that cough and sneeze.
• Don’t visit poorly ventilated places.
• Keep warm, get fresh air and sun-shine.
• Don't use common drinking cups, towels, etc.
• Cover your mouth when you cough and sneeze.
• Avoid Worry, Fear and Fatigue.
• Stay at home if you have a cold.
• Walk to your work or office.
• In sick rooms wear a gauze mask like in illustration.

The 1918 influenza pandemic killed more than 50 million people worldwide. The flu virus strain, H1N1 influenza A, killed young, healthy adults in addition to the very young, the very old, and people with existing health conditions. Victims tended to die from pneumonia as a secondary complication.

“Please Don’t Kiss Me!” – Moms Asking People Not to Kiss Their Babies to Avoid Catching the Flu in the 1930s

When we see a cute baby, some of us get a sudden urge to take a closer look and even reach in and give them a kiss. However, back in the 1930s, that kissing-urge led to the spread of the flu. Parents went so far as to place a warning sign on their adorable kids that read: “Flu Precaution Please Don’t Kiss Me.”

(Photos: Getty Images)

A Flu Mask Modified for a Smoke, 1919

A photo of a flu mask touted by Popular Science magazine during the 1918 pandemic. It has a hole for smoking – but not for exhaling the smoke. Popular Science was satirizing the use of masks, which they said were scientifically ineffective.

(From Popular Science, May 1919)

It’s Still Flu Season! Here’s a Few Helpful Precautions, ca. 1920

The flu, or influenza, is a highly contagious viral infection that mainly affects the respiratory system. It’s usually a seasonal illness, with yearly outbreaks killing hundreds of thousands of people around the world.

Though rare, completely new versions of the virus may infect people and spread quickly, resulting in pandemics (an infection that spreads throughout the world) with death tolls in the millions. Symptoms of the flu include sudden onset fever, coughing, sneezing, a runny nose, and severe malaise, though it can also include vomiting, diarrhea and nausea.

Influenza has plagued humankind for centuries and, given its highly variable nature, may continue to do so for centuries to come.

“Precautions against Influenza,” February 3, 1920. (National Archives)

This flyer from 1920 warned naval employees to take precautions against the contraction and spread of influenza.

• Avoid persons with coughs and colds.
• If obliged to cough or sneeze yourself, when near another person, turn the face or cover the mouth and nose with a handkerchief: such handkerchief should afterwards be sterilized by boiling or be destroyed.
• Avoid common drinking cups.
• Do not expectorate promiscuously.
• Do not stand close to another person while conversing and do not talk directly at them. Discharges from the mouth are disseminated while talking.
• Avoid poorly ventilated rooms and see that living and sleeping quarters are well ventilated.
• Avoid crowds, especially within doors.
• Spend as much time as possible in the open, especially in the sunshine.
• Dress warmly, avoid “wet feet”. Keep regular hours.

End of Days: Psychic Sylvia Browne’s Book Possibly Predicted 2020 Coronavirus Outbreak 12 Years Ago

Popular psychic Slyvia Browne, who passed away in 2013, released a book called End of Days: Predictions and Prophecies About the End of the World in 2008, and possibly predicted the global outbreak of coronavirus. A photo of an excerpt from the book is going viral across social media platforms and is spooky enough to reach for that box of tissues to wipe your sweat.

End of Days: Predictions and Prophecies about the End of the World, a 2008 book written by Sylvia Browne predicted global outbreak of coronavirus.

“In around 2020 a severe pneumonia-like illness will spread throughout the globe, attacking the lungs and the bronchial tubes and resisting all known treatments. Almost more baffling than the illness itself will be the fact that it will suddenly vanish as quickly as it arrived, attack again 10 years later, and then disappear completely,” the book reads.

Interestingly, she also predicted that a bacterial infection resembling the 'flesh-eating disease' would arrive in 2010. According to her prediction, the disease was supposed to be ‘extremely contagious disease’. One may remember that the deadly outbreak of swine flu pandemic in 2009-19 killed around 575,000 people worldwide.

40 Historical Photos of the 1918 Spanish Flu That Show What a Global Pandemic Looked Like in the 1910s

Between 1918 and 1919, an outbreak of influenza spread rapidly across the world, and killed more than 50 million—and possibly as many as 100 million—people within 15 months. The speed of the pandemic was shocking; the numbers of dead bodies overwhelmed hospitals and cemeteries. Quarantine centers, emergency hospitals, public use of gauze masks, and awareness campaigns were all undertaken swiftly to halt the spread. But as World War I was coming to a close, millions of soldiers were still traveling across the globe, aiding the spread of the disease.

The flu was first observed in Europe, the US and parts of Asia before it quickly spread throughout the world. It was wrongly named the Spanish flu because it was first reported in the Madrid daily newspaper ABC. However, modern scientists now believe the virus could have started in Kansas, US. In 1918, there was no vaccination to protect against flu. It was later discovered that in many victims the vicious virus had invaded their lungs and caused pneumonia.

Gathered here are images from the battle against one of the deadliest events in human history, when the flu killed up to 6 percent of the Earth’s population in just over a year.

California, 1918. The 1918 Spanish flu killed up to 50 million people around the world and has been called “the mother of all pandemics”.

A U.S. Army camp hospital in Aix-Les-Baines France during World War I. It is estimated that 20 percent – 40 percent of U.S. soldiers and sailors were ill, primarily from influenza virus, during the height of the war causing tremendous suffering and impacts on mission readiness. (Corbis / National Geographic)

Policemen stand in a street in Seattle, Washington, wearing protective masks made by the Seattle Chapter of the Red Cross, during the influenza epidemic in 1918. (National Archives)

Combating influenza in Seattle in 1918, workers wearing masks on their faces in a Red Cross room. (National Archives)

Corpsmen in caps and gowns ready to attend patients in the influenza ward of the U.S. Naval Hospital on Mare Island, California, on December 10, 1918. (U.S. Navy)

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