Announcement of new polio vaccines has once again raised hopes of eradicating polio. But the ongoing difficulties of their predecessors provide a cautionary tale, writes Robert Fortner
In June 2023, a research article in Nature heralded new, “more stable” versions of the vaccines against two of the three types of poliovirus (types 1 and 3).1 “Super-engineered polio vaccines created to help end polio,” read a BBC headline.2 “Polio endgame finish is in sight,”3 added a Nature news article.3 The backdrop, however, is a little muddier.
A similar fanfare had greeted the first of this new generation of oral polio vaccines in 2021. Novel oral polio vaccine type 2 (nOPV2) targets type 2 polio and went straight into widespread use. But it remains far from clear how well nOPV2 works.
Before it was approved for emergency use, scientists warned that nOPV2 would not solve the problem set for it: to stamp out vaccine-derived polio. So far, it has not done so. Instead there are unansw
Seven children were paralyzed by vaccine-derived polio linked to the new nOPV2 polio vaccine developed by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, according to health officials in the Democratic [.]
Many years ago, Dan Olmsted and Mark Blaxill wrote a four part expose of the man made, environmental creation of the polio scare called The Age of Polio: How an Old Virus and New Toxins Created a Man-made Epidemic. Below.