I am showing my age, but I know how the March of Dimes began.  My mother
contracted polio when my brother was a mere 6 mo old (I was a grown-up 4 at
the time).  The March of Dimes began as a means of collecting money to
stamp out poliomyelitis.  This was a dread disease in many countries.  In
the US in the 1940s (and probably earlier), people dreaded the coming of
summer, when epidemics occurred nearly every year.  (My mother got the
disease in late May, by the way).

I recall several stories from my elderly relatives about what they THOUGHT
caused it and what wierd steps they took to avoid "bringing it home".
These tales had nothing to do with reality (that is, they did NOT know what
caused it) and are a fascinating example of how fears dictated behaviors.

After the development of the oral polio vaccine in the mid-1950s (you can
bet that my brother and I were shoved to the front of the line when they
became available country-wide!), the March of Dimes changed its orientation
from polio prevention to the eradication of birth defects.

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"We are all faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly
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Kathleen G. Auerbach,PhD, IBCLC (Ferndale, WA USA) [log in to unmask]
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