So, I looked in the comments, expecting to see discourse or historical background etc, but I found none. Therefore, I decided to learn more and add background. Apparently this machine was used because of polio because polio paralyzes your lungs. According to the wiki article on this bad boy, patients would spend two weeks in there sometimes. They still have these machines, though much, much more modern but theyâre barely used at all anymore:Â âIn 1959, there were 1,200 people using tank respirators in the United States, but by 2004 there were only 39. By 2014, there were only 10 people left with an iron lung.â (x)
Iâve read about one man who still lives in an iron lung. He taught himself how to breathe again by gulping down air, but itâs quite laborious because of the paralysis. His name is Paul Alexander, and heâs a lawyer. Heâs 71 years old and has spent 65 years in an iron lung. Wild, right? Heâs been working on a memoir that he was inspired to write by the recent resurgence of cases of polio caused by anti-vaccers.
Source: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cbc.ca/amp/1.4414081 (canât hyperlink because Iâm on mobile, apologies)
Itâs amazing to me to recognize that we only defeated polio in this past century - that my motherâs father had it (he got lucky, it only deformed his feet and thereby kept him out of a couple wars); my mother got the big vaccination that left her upper arm scarred; and by the time I was vaccinated, polio basically didnât exist. My grandfather must have been born like around 1900, so - in the space of less than 75 years, this was no longer something that parents dreaded the possibility of every summer.
In the 1950s, my mother would go to the corner shop. The owners had a daughter a few years older than my mum. She lived in an iron lung in the back of the shop. Vaccinate your fucking kids.
Reminder that children were in these iron lungs. Children who just wanted their mums and dads, or wanted to cuddle their precious stuffed toy, but couldnât because of the nature of these machines. Crying because they donât want to go in this big scary tank, but if they donât go in the iron lung they would die.
And thereâd be hospital wards of these.
This BBC documentary is an excellent one to watch, first as just as a history into the polio vaccineâs creation and why it was important, but also to get a glimpse of the iron lungs in action - 6:58 is when you can see footage of children in these things.
The polio vaccine exists so children wouldnât have to have a machine breathe for them. All vaccines exist because we donât want people to suffer. Please vaccinate and get vaccinated.
