It was not long ago that scientists proclaimed victory over polio,
the dread disease of the 1950s. More recently polio resurfaced, not
conquered at all, spreading across the countries of Africa. As we
once again face the specter of this disease, along with other
killers like AIDS and SARS, this powerful book reminds us of the
personal cost, the cultural implications, and the historical
significance of one of modern humanity's deadliest biological
enemies. In "Polio and Its Aftermath" Marc Shell, himself a victim
of polio, offers an inspired analysis of the disease. Part memoir,
part cultural criticism and history, part meditation on the meaning
of disease, Shell's work combines the understanding of a medical
researcher with the sensitivity of a literary critic. He deftly
draws a detailed yet broad picture of the lived experience of a
crippling disease as it makes it way into every facet of human
existence.
"Polio and Its Aftermath" conveys the widespread panic that
struck as the disease swept the world in the mid-fifties. It
captures an atmosphere in which polio vied with the Cold War as the
greatest cause of unrest in North America--and in which a strange
and often debilitating uncertainty was one of the disease's salient
but least treatable symptoms. Polio particularly afflicted the
young, and Shell explores what this meant to families and
communities. And he reveals why, in spite of the worldwide relief
that greeted Jonas Salk's vaccine as a miracle of modern science,
we have much more to fear from polio now than we know.
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