[Poliomyelitis in Landsteiner's time and today]

At a meeting of the Royal and Imperial Association of Physicians in Vienna on December 18, 1908 Dr. Karl Landsteiner reported on the successful experimental transmission of poliomyelitis from man to ape in a study which he undertook together with Erwin Popper. In a scientific article that was published shortly after the meeting, Landsteiner wrote that "the poliomyelitis virus belongs to the group of filterable micro-organisms". Soon, Landsteiner's results were confirmed by other colleagues. During a congress in Washington 1912 Landsteiner declared that the development of a vaccine against poliomyelitis might prove difficult but was certainly possible in his opinion. It took another 45 years before the first polio vaccine was available (1955 Salk) and another 5 years until the oral vaccine (1960 Sabin) was implemented. The incidence of poliomyelitis decreased dramatically in industrial countries as a result of vaccination. Today, poliomyelitis is still an enormous threat in developing countries. Together with many national and international institutions the WHO fights this situation very hard by means of vaccination campaigns. The incidence of side effects and insufficient reactions is small with both vaccines. New techniques in the field of molecular biology and a good knowledge of the poliovirus make it likely that further improvements on the vaccines which are currently available will take place.