Evening star., 1955-09-04
SoIk Vaccine Aid Seen,
Even in Only One Shot

AAd eaA ally AofS AAA1Au4htASA
enough people to explain this
years low rate, wNhoutany use
Iof vaccine.
DR.. Leonard Scheele, surgeon
general of the United States
Public Health Service, recently
said polio data begin to point
to the conclusion the vaccine Is
good to give protection" He did
not say on what this was based,
and added, there is nothing
very objective on which to base
la finding until fall at the
earliest"
An Associated. Press survey
two weeks ago indicated q 46
per cent decline in polio deaths
this year compared with last.
generally regarded as q fairly
average polio year.
Picture Might Change
So there are the straws. Why
shouldn't you use them te build
ia bridge to some accurate or
sound conclusion?
Because so many of the sta
! tistics cited deal just with re-
ported but not-yet-confirmed
cases Of polio. in either group Of
children. It's not easy to dag
nose real polio at any first
glance. Even among cases ad-
mitted to hospitals as acute
polio, 5 per cent or so turn out
to have been something else.
Also, the current polio pic
ture might change suddenly at
any time. A. careful check-up
and careful analysis of all sta
tistics is needed.
| For the soundest analysis,
many polio experts want to COM
pare what happened among chill
dren, vaccinated or not, in the
same individual year age groups.
How many actually had polio?
Was it the parlytic type? Which
ones had been vacclnated. and
how many shots? What type
of polio did they have? Where
did they live? Was an epidemic
current there?
| The actual incidence Of para
lytic polio is crucial, No one
would really care at all about
polio if it only gave you tenn
porary fever or temporary aches
and pains, and never killed or
never caused permanent paral-
ysis. II it had no more serious
after-effects than the common
cold. polio could be shrugged of {.
Analysis Underway
/ This kind of careful analysis
of polio in 1855 is already un-
derway. A special surveillance
unit of the Public Health Ser
vice is investigating each re-
ported case, to get at vital facts
needed for the ultimate and re-
lvealing comparisons.
A special study also Is under
way in Massachusetts,, and 1t
might produce some answers
within . few weeks. And the
National Foundation for Infan-
tile Parlysis expects some good
indications from It's current study
of hospital admissions and dis
charges.
Such studies will finally an
swer whether the "straws" were
good weather vanes. and how
good.
Over the Nation, 6S million
children got one shot, and a
fairly small percentage Of them
got a second shot.
Each State had only part OF
that number, and what happened
In one single State gives very
little basis for the overall pic
jture.
Adding ar the experience in
52S States gives q total, with no
pretense made that such addi-
tion cancels out variations, or
gives q really accurate clue.
Result Of Figures
Here's the result Of such addi-
Ition:
Total vaccinated Tin 1st and
I'd grades 3,l40.866.
Total reported cases Of polio,
f261.
Total unvaccinsted (mostly
estimates of remaining So years
of age) 3,289.060.
Total reported eases of polio,
t10,995.
This would indicate an at
tack rate of 3.3 per 100000
Iamong vaccinated youngsters,
compared with q rate of 335
among those not. Remember this
is a very rough, overall figure
on general statistics.
It may be of interest that the
Public Health Service at last
report cited AIS cases of polio
reported among 6.5 million vac
tcinated. Less than half, or l89.
were listed as paralytic.
The 23-State tally shows
roughly half of the reported
cases of polio among 3 million
plus vaccinated children, which
in turn is a bit less than half of
the total known vaccinated.
Any such sampling survey as
this runs into the difficulty that
methods of counting varied
among the different states.
For example, in California,
not included in the 23-State
tally-there are 80 cases re-
ported since April among 49,
1870 children given shots.
Early Cases Deducted
To give a clearer picture of the
|Salk vaccine protection. Cali
fornia authorities say they de-
duct early cases, before June
Us, which might have been
caused by any faulty or live
virus vaccine. There were 81
such cases there before June l5.I
so the California report gives 80
cases among vaccinated since
lmid-June, with 210 in the 5-to-9I
age group, but doesn't give any
estimate of children in that age