Supporting the Goals and Ideals of Observing the Year of Polio Awareness

SUPPORTING THE GOALS AND IDEALS OF OBSERVING THE YEAR OF POLIO AWARENESS -- (House of Representatives - September 19, 2006)

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Mr. DEAL of Georgia. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of House Resolution 526, a resolution authored by Mr. Rothman of New Jersey that supports the goals and ideals of observing the Year of Polio Awareness. I commend Representative Rothman for introducing this important resolution, which helps to raise awareness about polio and the continued need to vaccinate all children against polio and other infectious diseases.

While many of us in this Chamber are old enough to remember polio as a national tragedy that claimed thousands of lives and left thousands more permanently disabled, younger generations may have only read about polio in history books. But the story of polio, its spread, its dreaded consequences, the millions of lives it touched, and our ultimate triumph over the disease, should forever remain etched in our national memory.

Recently, the Smithsonian Institution's Museum of American History held an exhibit commemorating the 50th anniversary of the injectable, killed polio vaccine, also known as the Salk vaccine. The exhibit detailed the incredible story of polio in the United States, beginning with the 1916 outbreak in New York City that paralyzed 9,000 people and killed 2,400, most of whom were children less than 10 years of age. It went on to tell visitors about the all-consuming race to find a vaccine, from the story of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who may have been paralyzed by polio and went on to found the March of Dimes, the organization that raised hundreds of millions of dollars for polio research and treatment, and for which President Roosevelt's image was etched on the United States dime; to the research efforts led by Jonas Salk, Albert Sabin, and others to come up with a vaccine that was safe and effective; to the mammoth public health effort needed to vaccinate all children in the United States once a workable vaccine had been found; and, finally, to the worldwide effort to eradicate polio in the latter 20th century. The fight against polio is an amazing story that deserves to be remembered and retold.

But like most museum exhibits, the most striking things about the exhibits were the images. On display were several iron lungs, the metal apparatuses that helped to keep children and adults with polio alive. These metal contraptions restricted all movement and were mostly small because they primarily housed children. They were necessary to help polio patients continue to breathe. Photographs depicted huge warehouses that had been converted to makeshift hospital wards, filled with rows of iron lungs and the children inside.

Other pictures showed parents standing on ladders and soap boxes, peering through hospital windows, trying to see their children who had been quarantined. Such pictures are painful reminders of a past that should never be relived.

The resolution before us today reminds all of us that we have all the tools needed to prevent the reemergence of polio in this century. By far the most crucial weapon in the fight against infectious disease is vaccination, the medical advance that has saved more lives than any other. Vaccines continue to serve as the first line of defense against infectious disease. The resolution rightly recognizes the need of every child to be vaccinated against polio. It also recognizes the 1.6 million Americans who survived polio, but still suffer from its effects today.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this important resolution.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. DEAL of Georgia. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, certainly as we talk about the elimination of polio, it is one of the great success stories, but one in which we must continue to be vigilant, as has been pointed out. As a Rotarian, I am proud that my organization, on an international basis, undertook as a project to eliminate polio worldwide, poured millions of dollars into that effort, and contributed greatly to the success of the elimination of polio in other parts of the world.

But as we talk about the polio vaccine, a disease that has been able to be treated with a vaccine, we are also on the verge of recognizing that we are going to have, as we currently have, a problem with vaccine manufacturers for not only this disease, but many other diseases as well.

Today we only have four United States vaccine manufacturers. That is down from about 50 that we had back in the 1960s. The bipartisan Institute of Medicine has identified three primary factors as the reason we have lost vaccine firms and for the reluctance of firms to get into the manufacturing of vaccines.

One is the economic realities, and certainly those are very real; secondly, the burdensome regulations that they must go through; and third, legal liability. As we deal with other diseases, in addition to this question of polio, we are going to be faced with the fact that we are going to have to encourage manufacturers of vaccines to get in the marketplace, and we must deal with those three factors as we move forward on this issue of vaccines for other illnesses as well.

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