Hello 2025! Let's start talking about all the work that went into the Polio vaccine & our current mostly polio-free world! From an endemic disease that had been around for all time to the resurgence in the 1900s, Polio was a 'childhood' disease that people just expected to happen. Until our dear FDR was afflicted, and the March of Dimes changed philanthropy forever. Learn about fundraising, testing, and the two different polio vaccines this week with us on Doomed to Fail!
Hello 2025! Let's start talking about all the work that went into the Polio vaccine & our current mostly polio-free world! From an endemic disease that had been around for all time to the resurgence in the 1900s, Polio was a 'childhood' disease that people just expected to happen. Until our dear FDR was afflicted, and the March of Dimes changed philanthropy forever. Learn about fundraising, testing, and the two different polio vaccines this week with us on Doomed to Fail!
Some sources:
Polio: An American Story by David M. Oshinsky - https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/polio-an-american-story_david-m-oshinsky/278057/item/10370684/#edition=3607391&idiq=3905481
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/17/health/robert-f-kennedy-jr-polio-vaccines.html
Hi Friends! Our transcripts aren't perfect, but I wanted to make sure you had something - if you'd like an edited transcript, I'd be happy to prioritize one for you - please email doomedtofailpod@gmail.com - Thanks! - Taylor
Taylor: It's been a beautiful December in January in Austin
>> Taylor: In the matter of the people of State of California vs. Orenthal James Simpson, case number BA097. And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.
>> Farz: Happy 2025, Taylor. How are you?
>> Taylor: I'm, good. How are you?
>> Farz: I'm good. I. It is a beautiful. It's been a beautiful December in January and so far, January in Austin. But today's like, tonight's the first night where it's going to get freezing.
>> Taylor: And I saw that in my. In my app, because I have it on there and it's going to be cold tomorrow, right?
>> Farz: Yeah, yeah. We're getting get into the 20s. I just finished wrapping up all the plants outside, and. Oh, wow, faucets and doing all that, so.
>> Taylor: Wow. Wow. Yeah, it's nice here.
The electric grid in Puerto Rico is not doing very well following Hurricane Maria
Well, I was in Puerto Rico for Christmas and New Year's, and it was so hot and humid. Oh, my God. So I'm happy to be someplace where it's, like, a little bit cold and dry.
>> Farz: Can you explain what the electricity situation was there?
>> Taylor: Yes. So in. Well, let me introduce ourselves.
>> Farz: Oh, right.
>> Taylor: Hello. Welcome to Doomed to Fail. We bring you history's most notorious disasters, epic failures twice a week. I'm Taylor, joined by Fars, and we are back from our Christmas break. And, yeah, no, the electric grid in Puerto Rico is not doing very well. Essentially, like, the power went out twice while we were there. The first night just went off in the middle of the night in San Juan. And then the second time on New Year's Eve, it went off on the entire island.
>> Farz: Is it kind of like the situation with Texas where it just wasn't built for the scale that it's operating at?
>> Taylor: I don't think so. I think it needs to be repaired and updated. I don't know if that's the same thing. Yeah, it's not like the scale. It's like the, Just like it's old, you know?
>> Farz: Oh, I see what you're saying. Yep, yep, yep. Okay. Okay.
>> Taylor: Yeah, yeah. But, But it was fine. Like, a small blackout is always kind of fun, you know, you just like. Like, if it's one night, it's nice. You get to, like, light candles and you don't have to watch tv and you can just, like, chill out and, like, it's nice. And then, like, we went. And we. We went out to a bar, and then the lights went on. Everybody was so excited. And that's fun. Like a black outfit. Like, that's good. But Then, like, we also know people in different. In Puerto Rico were during Hurricane Maria, they didn't have electricity for, like, 168 days.
>> Farz: Yeah, that's not.
>> Taylor: That is not fun.
>> Farz: Not fun. My funnest memory from la. Well, one of my funnest memories from LA was when we had a blackout, remember? And we all went down to the Mexican restaurant.
>> Taylor: Oh, yeah, that was during the day at work.
>> Farz: It was during the day. Yeah, it was during the work day. And we're like, we never took off during the day. And we just like, let's just go have margaritas. It was fun.
>> Taylor: When I worked in Glendale at the. My next job, the Glendale grid, is absolute shit. And, it went down twice in the summer that I worked there, like, three months. All the power went out twice. At one time, I was looking out the window, I was in a meeting, and I watched a electric pole explode. And then all the lights went out.
>> Farz: That's kind of freaky.
>> Taylor: I was like, this place is garbage.
>> Farz: I think I saw an electric, pole explode here in my house. Like, I don't actually see it, but I saw sparks flying out of this window. Behind this window is just, like, trees, so you can't really see anything. But I saw the sparks. Like, that's probably dangerous.
>> Taylor: It's probably bad. Yeah. but it was. But it was super fun. And I had a great time and, the kids had a great time, and we're just adjusting to being back on this time zone onto the new.
>> Farz: Year, which feels like it's. It's like I could have had two more weeks of this. We would have been fine.
>> Taylor: Yeah, I don't really feel ready to, like, be like, oh, I'm thinking about my goals for 2025 yet. You know, I'm kind of like. I don't know, I just kind of rolled into this. Maybe when I, like, go back to work and people want to, like, talk about stuff again, but, like, my husband shares something where, you know, you get back to work on Monday and you're like, I don't remember what I do.
>> Farz: You know, I did kind of. And this sounds really stupid, I did kind of try and work a little bit, like, on a daily basis. Just like. Like, I totally didn't forget what the motions of working were. Mm m. And so the. The punch in the face of a first full day back wasn't as hard. So.
>> Taylor: Yeah, No. I brought my computer on vacation. I was like, you know, just in case something happens. And I didn't open it once. So proud of Myself.
>> Farz: That was a good move.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: Proud of you for that. sweet.
Today we're gonna do an episode that you have been researching
So today we're gonna do an episode that you have been researching and going to be presenting. So what are we diving into?
>> Taylor: Cool. I know that you were like, if we don't have anything for this week, we don't have to do it, but I've been reading this book for, like, my whole life. It seems like I read a really boring ass long book about this. So I was like, I can get this out of my brain so I can do something else. The topic isn't boring, but the book was very long and boring, if that makes sense.
>> Farz: Okay.
>> Taylor: so I'm going to talk about a disease that is almost 100% eradicated, but was a really, really big deal about 100 years ago.
>> Farz: Polio.
>> Taylor: Polio, Yep. I read Polio An American Story. Long and boring, but got the job done. I learned a lot about it and I have some New York Times articles that I will share as well. Do you know anything about polio?
>> Farz: I know the last human being to have to live in an iron lung because of polio just died. And he was like a lawyer. He looked really rough. He was, like, in really rough shape. he wrote with his mouth, like a pen in his mouth. And yeah, he looked like he had a really. I would have rather just been thrown into the ocean.
>> Taylor: I know it's rough. There's a thing. I didn't write this down, but there is a thing where people who had polio are, very successful. Not. Not like everybody lives in an iron long as a lawyer, but, like, they tend to be more educated and more successful than their peers because they had to try harder, you know, to, like, get attention.
>> Farz: What else are you going to do? You can't do anything when you're in an iron lung.
>> Taylor: Yeah. So, yeah. Wild.
So let's talk about what polio is and what it does
So let's talk about what polio is and what it does. Fdr, of course, fundraising and then vaccines about it. So polio is called poliomyelitis. It is a virus and most cases are totally asymptomatic. And it only happens in humans. So you get it, you don't even notice and you move on. There's three types of polio. You have to get each type separately to get the immunity to all three. But then you have the immunity to all three. And a lot of times you would never have any idea that you had it for most of history. It's been around forever. It will give you maybe a headache or a fever, like a little one. But if you Start to feel that your neck hurts. You can't move your neck. You start to feel like your limbs are aching. Maybe you can't move your legs. Like that is the one. It gets really, really bad. And it has gone probably to your brain stem, and that's what causes paralysis. But that is a very, very small percent. Like I said, it's like 1% of people who get it, get that paralysis. And another thing is that they learned later is that it, actually gets worse as you get older. So you, you can, like, live with what you have, but then it's going to get worse later, so it kind of always stays with you. And, then a very, very small amount end in death, but not that many paralysis.
>> Farz: Then, like, everything goes paralyzed.
>> Taylor: Depends. It can be like your legs. It can be like your whole body. That's why you would need the iron lung. It's a conversation. It can vary.
>> Farz: Did FDR have polio?
>> Taylor: Maybe. Okay, so it's a poop disease. It has to do with getting dirty water in your mouth. So it's been around, like I said, forever, and for most of time, it's been endemic, which means everybody would get it one way or another. It's possible that there's an ancient Egyptian tablet that shows a carving, a drawing of someone who has it because they have, like, smaller legs for their body. And it was something that was just, like, always around, but no one knew what it was. And they probably were like, it's the mom's fault or a witch or something, you know, for all the time they. In the West. It was found as a disease in 1789 by a doctor named Michael Underwood. And the virus was identified in 1909 by a doctor named Carl Landsnider. So very new that we even, like, knew that it was a virus. And also very new that we even knew that there are viruses. We didn't know about viruses until, like, 1916. Crazy.
>> Farz: Yeah. Kind of makes sense.
>> Taylor: You just, like, didn't know what. Why people were getting sick.
>> Farz: Yeah, I mean, I was in bacteria only like, a little bit before that.
>> Taylor: Yeah. I thought it was like, who the fuck knows?
>> Farz: That's why. That's why I'm like. Like, we are so lucky for the time that we live in when everybody's like, oh, my God, it's the worst time ever. And it's like, it is the best time ever. Like, yes, no human would have want to survive any other time. But this time, right now.
>> Taylor: Yeah. It doesn't mean we can't criticize it. And Want better, but it doesn't mean.
>> Farz: But that's the thing. In the future, they're going to look back and be like, can you believe these animals lived in 2025?
>> Taylor: Absolutely.
>> Farz: How could they survive?
>> Taylor: Yeah. Oh my God, how gross. But I feel grateful to have air conditioning and not have polio and to wash my hands.
>> Farz: You think just washing your hands feels so nice, doesn't it?
>> Taylor: Like it does. I mean, I enjoy being clean and I feel like for. I'm gonna talk about it, but for a long time, people were not clean.
>> Farz: No, definitely not.
>> Taylor: No. So. But it's interesting. So wait till I get to that part. Cause it actually has to do. The cleanliness has to do with the polio. So every once in a while, someone ends up paralyzed. Someone dies from this disease. No one knows what it is. And that's just the way it is for thousands of years of human time. Then in the early 20th century, something interesting happens. And especially in America. And this goes to what we were just saying is that there's a ton of polio outbreaks, more than ever before. And there are towns that get totally overrun. So like you go to school, and then two weeks later, you know, five of the kids in your class are dead and three of them are paralyzed. It just like, is terrible. No one knows what to do. No one knows where it's coming from. Their towns are going to like complete lockdown. The town of Hickory, North Carolina, where my father in law works right now, now, and goes there like every week to be a doctor. But they were called polio city and they would send polio patients there because so many people there had it. And they're trying to figure out, like, what is going on in some families.
Polio is hitting middle and upper class neighborhoods more than poor neighborhoods
Like all the kids die. You know, like 13 kids, 11 of them die. Just like terrible stories. And it's getting worse and worse and no one can really figure out why. It's hitting middle and upper class neighborhoods more than poor neighborhoods, which is also confusing because they have this idea that you're getting sick because of dirt and germs and something like that is starting to be a thing. But they're like, why is this hitting the nicer neighborhoods and not the worst neighborhoods? If you were further away from the city, you are more likely to get it, which is weird because cities were gross.
>> Farz: are you going to answer why?
>> Taylor: I am.
>> Farz: Okay.
>> Taylor: Do you think you know why?
>> Farz: No. It's the poor enriched thing is incredibly confusing. If, if it's a poop disease, it's confusing.
>> Taylor: But here. But I'LL tell you why in one second. So in 1916, there's an outbreak where over 20,000 people died. The Roosevelt family, they had all five of their kids. They, FDR, sent them out of New York to Campobello, which is their, estate in Canada, with the kind of their vacation home to get out of it in. By 1949, there are like 40,000 cases a year, and it's growing. The 1949 summer was super hot, and it seemed to be getting worse. And it's not the worst thing statistically to happen to children. More children die from cancer, more children die from accidents than from polio during this time. But it's still alarming, and it's alarming when it comes because it comes fast and people don't know. Nothing you can do about it. There's no cure, you know. So the buildup to this is Americans being more focused on hygiene and healthcare. So our healthcare system now, what we just said isn't great, but shit ton better than it used to be because it was nothing. It was like, no one knows what a German, A, germ is. In Europe, people just are just starting to have, like, laboratories and, like, try to see things. It's, all very, very new. You, know, medical school was like, I don't know, hang out with this doctor for a week and learn how to read Latin. And you're a doctor.
>> Farz: Weren't they also, like, barbers? Weren't barbers also?
>> Taylor: Yeah, yeah. It was like, oh, this guy's gonna take this dirty razor and cut off your cyst. Whatever. Gross. So, in the early 1900s, the Rockefellers started the first lab in the United States. But there was plenty you couldn't see. So polio is a virus called the filter virus because you couldn't see it with the first microscopes. It would go through the filter that they had. Like, it was too small to see, so you couldn't even see it. You couldn't see viruses until 1915. But the hygiene part is super interesting. It's a little bit about, like, consumerism and ads because, like, now, you know, everyone's like, oh, take this for gut health. Take this for this. There's always going to be someone who's, like, trying to get you to buy something to be healthy in, like, a billion different ways. But in the early 1900s in the United States, they started to do things like sell Listerine. And they did that by telling people that they shouldn't have bad breath anymore. Which I'm, like 100% for that, that makes sense. But it was like these commercial companies that were in charge of like selling soap and selling things to get people to, to be cleaner. And then it had the public health benefits of people, you know, washing their hands and putting up screens on their windows and picking up trash on the street, things like that. Just like. And that resolved a lot of problems. another thing that they had was like DDT was being sprayed everywhere just to like eliminate the chance to see bugs and all of those things. So a lot of stuff was happening that was objectively good. You know, people are getting cleaner. But the problem is, and this is the problem, this is the, the middle class versus city thing. If you don't get exposed to polio when you are a baby, when you can develop the immunity and you get it later, it's going to be worse. Does that make sense? So that was the problem is that in cities and like places that were less clean, you will be exposed to it really early on. And it was usually nothing, nothing would happen. You get immune, you wouldn't even know it had happened. But then all of a sudden there's places where everything is disinfected. So you're not going to get polio when you're a kid. So you're going to get it. If you get exposed to it later, it's much, much worse. So that's why if someone comes into town, you're like little 1950s American town with polio. That's why a lot of the kids are going to get it all of a sudden.
>> Farz: Is that also the logic behind chickenpox that like you need to get it young so that it's not as bad if you get it?
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: Older. Because if you get it late, it's. It's like shingles, isn't it?
>> Taylor: Yeah,
>> Farz: It's really bad apparently.
>> Taylor: Yeah, yeah. It's supposed to be awful. So. Yeah, kind of like that. So the younger you are, the better if you get it. So the people aren't getting it anymore and that's why it's hitting those nicer neighborhoods.
There are some diseases that are racially related, but polio is not one
>> Farz: Got it.
>> Taylor: they also, you know, they also would blame immigrants, of course, you know, blaming like the Italians for, for bringing it over and they what, 1900s? Yeah, like this is like 1940.
>> Farz: Italians weren't white in the 1940s.
>> Taylor: I know, that's, that was my point. I know it doesn't. Just hating the immigrant. Who cares where they come from? So they would like blame them. M. And then they also said that it didn't hurt. African American kids, like they weren't getting it when like the reality is that they lived in worse neighborhoods because of America and they would get it early and then they didn't have the same problem. And then also there's not a lot of data about those neighborhoods anyway. So that's probably. That's not true. Obviously. You know.
>> Farz: Do we know that though? Because isn't it like there are some diseases that are racially.
>> Taylor: There are, but polio is not one of them. Okay, yeah, yeah. Polio just hits humans and it hits them the same regardless of anything else. So if you do get polio and you need help and you do become paralyzed, you. A lot of people would be wearing leg braces, you know, like FDR have a cocaine, have crutches, have like the little crutches on your arms. Some therapies help a little bit like hydrotherapy and massage. Try to get your muscles moving again. But there's no cure. You really can't come back. Come back from it. You know, there's things where like, you know, you can get one shoe that has a little bit of a heel. So you don't have much of a limp, but you'll always have like a little bit of paralysis and a limp if you have it. Yeah.
>> Farz: Didn't Forrest Gump have it?
>> Taylor: I m. Don't think so. Because. But he, but he is not real person and he was okay afterwards. So he couldn't have had polio.
>> Farz: He could have been real. We don't know that he wasn't.
>> Taylor: Okay. I don't know. We can look it up later. So the iron lung that you said, do you know what the iron lung does?
>> Farz: It breathes for you. Because I assume that your diaphragm is paralyzed.
>> Taylor: Yeah, exactly. So it is called a. So there's. It's a negative ventilator. So you like lay in it and it sucks the air out. So your body like contracts and then your puts air in and your body expands. So it like breathes for you by moving your body. And then the opposite of that is a positive ventilator, which are like the ones that we know about. Like when someone's on a ventilator because of COVID it's a positive ventilator where they're putting air into you and like pushing it out from inside of you rather than like pulling it away from you, out from the outside. But it's the same idea to breathe for you. Makes sense.
People think that FDR had polio, but it doesn't really matter
So now it's the 1920s and polio again isn't the most important thing. But it is scary. And FDR has just lost the election for Vice President of the United States. So he was like, on, that ticket they lost. He's trying to figure out what to do next. And he goes to a Boy Scout camp. And there's a picture of him standing at the Boy Scout camp. And like, he looks like everything is fine. Then that's the last photo of him standing. This is in 1921. He goes to Campobello, which is the Roosevelt's house in Canada. And there's this show that was about first ladies that was on Showtime. And I watched the first episode and I was like, this is stupid. But they, like, were so exact on, like, all the stereotypes. Like, Betty Ford was like, constantly m drinking and Michelle Obama was like, was weird. And then the Eleanor one, they had Eleanor and Louis Howe, who was one of their advisors, playing golf on the front lawn. And like, FDR comes in and he's like, drinking a beer and like, he's in his pajamas and he's like, oh, I feel so strong. You know, whatever. The story is that, like, FDR spent all day with the kids. They went out on boats, they had a great time. He got back home, they wanted to do this race which is like, you know those families that are like, very active.
>> Farz: Yeah. It's the Kennedy types.
>> Taylor: Yeah. So he's like, oh, there's race. So the race was like a two mile run and then a swim and then a swim back and then another two mile run. So he does that race with his kids and he comes back and he's wearing his bathing suit. His bathing suit's wet. And he sits in the house for a little bit checking his mail and his wet bathing suit. And he doesn't feel well. And, he goes to bed early and the next day his legs can't move. So the question then is like, what did he have? He was 39 years old, and people think that he has polio. Right. And a couple things here, like, there's stuff recently that says it could be Guillain bar syndrome, which is like another thing. But it doesn't really matter because the work he did was for the charity for polio. So, like, that's. Who cares now what he really had? You know, like, I don't. But if he had polio, the reason that he could have gotten polio is because of his isolation. Because when he was a kid, his mother was like, you are my precious gift to the world, baby, and you will not be around other people. So he lived the super isolated life. And then when he went to like college as a teen, he got every disease because he had never been around people before.
>> Farz: May I ask you a mother, can you. I've been thinking about this a lot for various reasons, but as a mom, like, can you understand it in an intellectual level, like why some parents become that way? That I must protect you at all costs for everything. You know, it's funny, my cousins, I have a cousin who, she's there, she's married to a guy and they're both like surgeons and they have. They came over my parents house with one of their babies and. Well, not a baby, I guess like a toddler or something. The toddler wanted like an apple. The toddler holds the apple as it's cut in half and drops on the, on the ground on the carpet. And then the dad just picks it up, rubs it on his leg and gives it back to the kid. It was like, yeah, like he needs to get sick. Like that's that. This is life. He has to get like, whatever. Yeah, I'm not gonna seal him in a vacuum seal. Like, what is it about those kinds of parents that do do that? I've never been able to like understand it.
>> Taylor: I feel like it's a little bit of like disinformation and wanting to control things. So like my father in law is a doctor and you could like have your leg falling off and he'd be like, you're fine. You know, like he's not, he's not, he's exactly like that. Like a doctor will be like, who cares? Like, you're fine. Like you're not dying. Are you dying? No, you're fine. And I think people who like, don't know what's going on. Like, he has, he's told us that he has like, you know, there are people who want to control every aspect of their child's life and that there's, it's just like not good for them at all. But I think that they want, need to control something. Maybe something else in their life isn't working, you know, and they have to control something. Like Sarah Roosevelt was like, all she had was fdr, you know, like she, her husband died. She just had this boy and she had all this money. She had nothing but time and money. So she was like, just dedicated her life to fdr. Like when FGR and ER got married, Sarah was like, oh, I bought you guys an apartment. And they're like, oh my God, thank you. And then they were like, look, this Apartment has a door in it that goes directly to my apartment. It's the same house. Surprise. Like she's crazy, you know, but she also raised the president. So you either raise a president or a serial killer. Those are your options.
>> Farz: You heard here first.
>> Taylor: Yeah, but, but that could be why he, that could be why he, he got it. the doctor came to see him, you know, on that first day. And just as a side note, the doctor sent him a bill of 600 and they were like, that feels harsh because in today's Money that's like $10,000. But that, but no one had insurance. He didn't have that until FGR made that, you know, I didn't know that.
>> Farz: I didn't know FDR was the one who did that.
>> Taylor: He was one of the people who like, made it like a big, like you had to have it like with your job. And he made Medicare and he made Social Security, like all those things to help people.
>> Farz: President, huh?
>> Taylor: Yeah, a couple good things. on September 16, 1921, on the COVID of the New York Times. There's no pictures on the COVID but it has a bunch of little stories on it, but the headline is FD Roosevelt ill of poliomyelitis brought on special car from Campo Bello, Bay of Fundy at a hospital here, recovering doctor says patients stricken by infantile paralysis a month ago and youth use of legs affected.
FDR started a foundation to help people with polio during his presidency
So, initially it was called infantile paralysis because you mostly got it when you were young. Probably because of that like immunity you have when you're a kid or you like isn't as bad as when you're, when you're a kid. So FDR does things like he buys a big part of land in Georgia, in Warm Springs, Georgia, where they have like these natural pools. That's supposed to help. It doesn't really help, but it makes you feel better. You know, those things feel nice and you're floating. Yeah.
>> Farz: If we can all afford to buy a hot springs far back there, we'd probably do it.
>> Taylor: Yeah. So he feels better. He, gets a little bit of massage that can help him maybe feel better. We also know this is where Eleanor Roosevelt really gets her stride because people are like, we need you to run for governor, we need you to be president. And er has to go out and attend a lot of events to keep his name in people's minds and like really like be the person for the family. But, it was very hard for him, obviously. Like he was a father of five, big personality, all these things and all Of a sudden, he can't. He can't walk. So he spent a lot of time in wheelchairs. When he was held up by braces or by people, it was hard for him. You know, they would do things like stand him against a railing or walk him to a podium, and it was a lot of effort for him to move his legs at all. He. When he. When he was working with the Warm Springs, he worked with his law partner, Basil O'Connor, to start a Warm Springs foundation to help people who had polio into his presidency. They change it in 1938 to the national foundation for Infant Paralysis, and they're about to change the way philanthropy works sort of like forever for the world. So the depression is kind of in here, and that's going to make it a little bit different. But they're going to start with, like, small dollar donations and things that people didn't do before. Like, there used to literally be a community chest, which I thought was only a monopoly, you know. The community chest.
>> Farz: Yes.
>> Taylor: Well, you would literally just like, donate to the community, and then someone would be in charge of allocating that money. So you'd be like, I'm going to donate this money to this area. And, they'd be like, okay, well, we need it in schools today, and we need it for something else tomorrow. And someone like a committee would allocate it. This was like donating to a very specific cause for a very specific reason. So it starts with these huge birthday parties for fdr. And I'm laughing because. Do you remember when you were in charge of making all those parties across the country?
>> Farz: Yeah. That did not, that did not go well.
>> Taylor: There was, like, a book launch that Farz and I were around, and they were like, fars, why don't you, why don't you have book reading parties all across the country? And you're like, okay. And then I don't. I don't know how many you schedules, but it was not. Yeah, it was not like 30,000 like they did for. Or like thousands they did for fgr, but they had huge birthday parties for him. They raised a ton of money. His birthday's at the end of January. and they don't do a lot of research, but they do help people. there are some, like, racial tensions. They don't help, like, everybody. As in places like Warm Springs in Georgia, where, you know, it's a lot more segregated than other places. But the main thing that the, the foundation does is pay medical bills for people who have polio, regardless of their Income status. So it's sort of a pay as much as you can system. But they want everybody to have the same amount of care. And they will spend in the years that. That is, that polio is our focus, they're going to spend like $230 million helping people get health care. So super good. Did a lot of really good stuff. Not a ton of research yet, but they do a lot of, the healthcare. So now there's a need to expand. The Federation for the foundation for Infant Paralysis, they want to raise more money. And an actor named Eddie Kanter suggests the March of Dimes. Have you heard of the March of Dimes? So it was kind of a play on a radio show called the March of Time, which was like a weekly show that would tell you what was going on in the world. And they were like, everybody, if you. Everyone mailed a dime or every kid milled a dime to the White House, like, we'd raised so much money. So once they made the first ask, it was like pandemonium at the White House. They got like hundreds and thousands of letters that had a dime in them or a quarter or a check or a dollar or all these things. And they just got like, they raised so much money with the March of Dimes. It was really, really incredible. after Roosevelt passes away, in 1946, on his. What would have been his 64th birthday, the Roosevelt dime was issued. And that's why he's on every dime these days.
>> Farz: I actually did not know that.
>> Taylor: Yeah, before that, it was like, I looked it up. It was like an eagle or something. But now it's FGR forever because of this. So the March of. So that turned the foundation to the March of Dimes. The March of dimes had like 30 local chapters. They did these really. They did a lot of, like, really interesting marketing where they made it like a mother's issue. And they were like, for mothers, like, you're the ones who are going to need to protect our. Your children. So they would do these mothers marches that are really cool. So they would say, like, spend a lot of time prepping. They'd send them everything they needed they needed. They'd say, going to local radio shows, put out flyers, tell your friends. And on, this. On FGR's birthday at the end of January, we in your neighborhood, anyone who wants to donate money can leave the porch light on. And if they don't want to donate money, they can leave it off. And you'll walk past their house and no one will be embarrassed. It won't be weird. Just every house, the porch light on, knock on the door, and they'll be ready with money. And it worked. And they raised a ton of money that way, too.
From 1938 through 1955, the March of Dimes spent $233 million on polio
>> Farz: Be so much easier to deal with.
>> Taylor: Isn't that cool? There was one cute story where, they went, there's a house where all the lights were off except the porch light. And they knocked on the door and they were, like, kind of nervous. And an old blind woman answered, and she was like, here's your money. Because she didn't need lights on. She was blind, but she need. She knew the portion that was going to be on so super cool. And it made philanthropy and it made giving something everybody could do. You know, like, before this, you didn't think about, I'm going to give a dime to a organization that's going to make a big global impact. But now you could. Another thing they did is the movies. In the movie theater, they would ask for money, and they made a shit ton of money that way, too. We would have, like, a little thing in that swimming. And I think that they've done that recently as well. They, like, ask for money in the movie theater. there was a movie, like a short film that played before the movies that would talk about the March of Dimes and get people to donate. And one of the first ones starred a very young Nancy Reagan. And she was an actress.
>> Farz: She was an actress.
>> Taylor: Yeah. So I think I said this before, but from 1938 through the approval of the vaccine, in 1955, the foundation spent $233 million on patient care. so more than 80% of the polio patients in the United States received aid from the Marsh of Dimes.
>> Farz: When. When did we get a vaccine?
>> Taylor: 1955.
>> Farz: How long was that? From when we. 1917 is when they knew it was a virus.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: Okay.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: So nearly 40 years.
>> Taylor: Yeah. So there are two types of polio vaccines. One is live, has, like, a live, version of the virus, and one is inactive. It has a killed version of the virus. COVID vaccine, for example, is an inactive vaccine. It has the killed version, not a live version of COVID There are two different men who made them. The one you know is Jonas Salk. You've heard that one, right?
>> Farz: No.
>> Taylor: No.
>> Farz: Why would I have known that?
>> Taylor: I don't know that. Everybody knew that. Jonas Salk is the. Is the doctor who made the live vaccine. And Albert Sabin is the one who made the kill vaccine. Nope. Opposite. Salk made the kill one. Saban made the live one. So Jonas salk was born October 28, 1914, in New York. His parents were immigrants, and he was the first person in his family to, like, really receive an education. He was Jewish, which makes it. Which is a big deal, because it was hard to get into college. Schools had very clear limits on the number of Jewish people they would allow in. For example, Yale in 1935 had 501 applicants, 76 people were accepted, and only five got in. So basically, 40% of the people who applied to Yale in 1935 were Jewish, and only 7% of the class that got in was Jewish. So, like, they were like, you can't have more than that many, many Jewish people in this class because of racism. I don't know. So he went to ccny, then NYU for medical school, and he worked on the flu virus, and he worked in Pittsburgh, and he had a list of things that he wanted to work on. And he probably was just like, I'm gonna work on polio because I'm gonna get a lot of money from the March of Dimes for this. And he did. He got a lot of, like, money for research, which is fine, because that's what you need, right?
>> Farz: So. So he did. Sorry, he did get into Yale.
>> Taylor: No, he didn't. But that was just an example of, like, He went to nyu, but just, like, the example of, like, the. How hard it was to get into medical school if you were Jewish.
>> Farz: Okay. So he was, like, the best of the best of the best of the best. Because he was okay.
>> Taylor: Yeah, like, he did. Because he, like, wasn't. like, his regular school grades were, like, okay. But when he started doing, like, lab work, that's where he really excelled. And they were like, this is where we need him. That kind of thing.
>> Farz: Yeah. By the way, I think that should be how everything works. Like, I don't get the whole. You need to be amazing at everything. It's like, yeah, just the thing that you have natural aptitude towards, like, grade that. Like, why do you care how good somebody is? It's something I don't care about.
>> Taylor: Totally. Anyways, I'm never gonna be able to climb a rope, but I can read.
>> Farz: Why do we spend so much time learning geometry? Like, how, How frequently have I had to use.
>> Taylor: Geometry m. While we were in Puerto Rico, our cousin's son, he's, like, 13.
We had to learn how to type in high school. Did you need a whole semester
He had geometry homework. And everybody was mad because they were like, that you're taking away from our vacation just geometry homework. Can't believe they're teaching you homework. Blah, blah, blah, but then we were on a boat, and I feel like we use geometry constantly to not hit other boats. Because you're, like, looking at another boat. You're like, I'm go this way.
>> Farz: I don't know if knowing the formulas helped you there.
>> Taylor: I also hate. I hated, like, having to, like, do the proofs. Those are the worst.
>> Farz: The whole thing, like, all of it was the whole point. Like, you got to know the math stuff because you can't have a calculator with you at all times.
>> Taylor: Like, yeah, that's stupid. And I would do so much of.
>> Farz: The stuff we learned. Taylor was so pointless. Cursive. I know you love cursive. What? We took classes on how to type. It's like, that's all we do. Like, why do we have to take a class on anyways? Whatever.
>> Taylor: Well, we had to learn how to type.
>> Farz: I mean, I guess, but, like, when we've just, At this point. Well, maybe we wouldn't have gone through careers we went into if we didn't know how to type.
>> Taylor: I can't imagine how hard my life would be if I didn't know how to type. But I also probably could have figured it out.
>> Farz: That's what I'm getting at. Did you need a whole semester?
>> Taylor: I don't think I took a whole semester in typing. It wasn't like, 1964 where I was, like, going to be a secretary, even though I was a secretary for, like, a decade.
>> Farz: No, in high school. Yeah. Like, was it high school? Yeah, I guess would have been high school. No, in, like, freshman year of high school.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: We had one full semester that was.
>> Taylor: Like following that turtle around the screen. Or.
>> Farz: Or you had the blocks fall.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: You'd have to hit the letter before it hit the ground.
>> Taylor: I'm always pretty impressed that I can do it without looking. I couldn't tell you where the letters are, but I know where they are.
>> Farz: Yeah, same page.
>> Taylor: That's pretty cool. M. Yeah. Anyway. Yes, I agree. And Jonas Falk was really good at lab work. That was where he excelled. That's where he's going to be a hero. some things that are some facts about this kill virus vaccine. An absolute insane amount of monkeys were killed to do this.
>> Farz: Like, I don't like that.
>> Taylor: Insane. So, just FYI, I would have much.
>> Farz: Rather the humans died.
>> Taylor: his vaccine is three shots, one for each type of polio. Because there are three different types of polio. There were questions with the testing that he did. A lot of it, I think, is, like, of the time and A lot of it is like, yeah, I don't know, because, like, some people wanted to do like half placebo, half the real polio shot. But he was like, how can I give these kids a fake shot? And then maybe they get polio later? You know, like, that would be unfair. And they were like, willing to, willing to risk themselves on this vaccine anyway on this trial. Then he also did some trials in places like the D.T. watson Home for Crippled Children and the Polk State School for the R Word and Feeble Minded. So that's not great.
>> Farz: What?
>> Taylor: No, those people couldn't really consent, you know.
>> Farz: Oh, he was doing testing on them. Okay.
>> Taylor: Yeah, testing the vaccine. In the end, almost 2 million children were involved in the trials. And it worked. It did. It did stop people from getting polio. It did help eradicate the major outbreaks. In 1955, it was, approved. There were some issues with how he shared the recipe, so it had to be very, very specific. And so he would kind of change it every once in a while and there was opportunity for error. And another something that I thought you might have heard is he went on like the radio or TV or something, and they said, who owns this vaccine? And he said, quote, well, the people. I would say there is no patent. Could you patent the sun? Which is like the whole point where he didn't make any money off of this besides.
>> Farz: Yeah, I did know that. Yeah.
>> Taylor: Yeah. So that brought up a whole thing because people were afraid of socialized medicine, of course, because they were like, but if it's for free from the government, who's going to pay the doctors? Why can't you have to go to the doctor and pay three copays to get these three shots and all these things?
Some people were upset with Salk because he never thanked them
But eventually the government was like, we're going to give this to the children. And they started doing it. in 1955, a batch from Qatar Labs, which is a lab in California that was making the vaccine, killed 11 children because they made it wrong. So that made, the testing and the quality control a lot higher for the vaccine. Some people were upset with Salk because he never thanked them. So he kind of like, let himself be like, oh, I'm just a humble lab doctor. But also carefully curated his own image. A lot of the photos of him were like, in pristine labs and they were all set up before he got there. It wasn't like him actually working. And he never won a Nobel Prize, but he did win a bunch of other awards. In 1977, President Jimmy Carter RIP gave him the Presidential Medal of freedom. The same year, he also gave it to Martin Luther King Jr. So, he also.
>> Farz: I'd rather. I'd rather have the millions. I, I'm just gonna go out on a limb and say, you can keep the award. I'd rather have the millions.
>> Taylor: Well, there were also things that, like, I mean, he got plenty of money. You know, he had, like, fellowships that gave him money. Like, one senator was like, we should pay him $10,000 a year until he dies for all the help that he did to America's children. Like, that didn't go anywhere. But people were like, we're going to continue to give this man money because they were excited. And he also, like, wrote books and was famous and, like, he was fine. But. Yes. So, just another little bit about his life. He was married to Donna Lindsay until their divorce in 1968. They had three sons. He. In 1970, he married artist Francois Guyot, and she was a French artist who had two kids with Picasso. So that's weird. She met Picasso. Yeah. But she met Picasso when she was 21. He was 61, which feels like, gross. like Dr. Seuss's widow, she. She managed the Salk Institute for Research until her death in 2023 at age 101. Salk himself died earlier, of course, on June 23, 1995, at the age of 80 in La Jolla, California, which is where he did a lot of his research. And again, gorgeous, gorgeous. So his was the kill vaccine. The live vaccine was made by Albert Sabin. He also had March of Dimes money. He was born in a part of Russia that is now Poland on August 26, 1906. And he was a different kind of researcher, a different kind of. And he really wanted the live vaccine. He thought that a live vaccine was the only one that could completely eradicate polio. He was one of the first people to see that polio could be grown in other tissue besides, like, brain tissue, because they were doing things like injecting polio into the brains of monkeys and trying to see what would happen. But he found it could grow in other tissue, and they were able to study it more kind of like with the Henrietta Lack stuff, where, like, you have the tissue cultures you can study outside of a body.
>> Farz: Yeah.
>> Taylor: And that was helpful for, like, make research go quicker and save animals. So that's good.
>> Farz: Which I like.
>> Taylor: Yeah. His vaccine is the oral one. So it's the one that you, either it's like drops or you eat it on a sugar cube. And he was mad because the United States was like, we're fine. We have this other one. We're not going to, we don't need this one. So he went to the, he went to the USSR and his vaccine between 1955 and 1961 was tested, slash, given to, at least 100 million people in the USSR, Eastern Europe, Singapore, Mexico and the Netherlands. So it was given to people all over the world and it worked as well. The problem is that with a live vaccine you can get polio from it. There is a chance, of something called reversion to virulence, where the little tiny bit of live polio in the vaccine becomes big, becomes back to being something that can kill you. So people did get polio from it. So it's not perfect, but it was something that was easier to produce and easier to administer. So they used it for a very, very, very long time in the United States. They switched from the Salk vaccine to the Sabin vaccine in the 60s, and that's when they used for a really long time. He got his Presidential Medal of freedom in 1986, among many, many other awards. He also did not get a Nobel Prize. Both Sabin and Salk are in the Polio hall of Fame in Warm Springs, Georgia, which still exists as a place. FDR history. So like I said, for a long time the live virus one was the one that was given. Most of the world's kids are vaccinated. Me, you. We took the live polio vaccine, orally. They switched back to the dead one in 2000. So in 2000 they switched back to Salk's vaccine because by the late 1990s, almost all the polio United States was from the live vaccine. Does that make sense, Taylor?
>> Farz: So we got injured, so we have polio.
>> Taylor: We had the live vaccine which gives us like that tiny bit of polio that makes you immune to it.
>> Farz: You're immune to because your body retains it.
>> Taylor: Yeah, like once you, once, you know, once you get it, your body learns how to fight it and then keeps that memory forever.
>> Farz: Interesting.
>> Taylor: Yes. We got the live polio vaccine. And the problem was now the, the only way people were getting it was from the vaccine. It was no longer something that was so me.
>> Farz: And you could have gotten real polio because of this?
>> Taylor: The chances were like almost zero, but they were there.
>> Farz: But you just said they brought back the kill one because the people were getting real.
>> Taylor: Yeah, they did. They did that. The chances were there. And that's why they brought back the kill one because they were like now we've eradicated it. There's no natural cases of polio anymore.
The only ones are from the vaccine because everybody was immune to it
The only ones are from the vaccine because everybody was. Was immune to it. So it looked a thing. So polio is eliminated in the United States, in the Americas, since 1994, which is like, north. North America, South America, Europe, Western Pacific, Asia, all polio free by the. By the World Health Organization, which means there have been no wild polio viruses for the last at least three years, like, in a row. So you can't just, like, get it out in the wild. The only two countries where polio is endemic and you can, if you're not vaccinated, actually, like, kind of get it naturally are Afghanistan and Pakistan. And that has to do with, like, misinformation and, like, their war zones, you know, so, yeah, that makes it hard. another misinformation example is in 2003 in Nigeria, a warlord said that the people who were giving the polio polio shots were sterilizing kids, which is obviously not true. And so polio reappeared. In 2013, nine workers who were giving polio vaccinations were murdered in Kano, Nigeria, by, like, vigilantes who thought they were hurting children. and polio survivors and religious leaders got them back on track and were told the people that. That, you know, that rumor was not true and that the vaccine was safe. And Africa has been polio free since 2020. So it worked.
>> Farz: Sweet. I'm glad it worked because that is terrifying. Like I said, like, in that situation, when you got, like, the iron lung guy, like, I mean, you know, God.
>> Taylor: Like, what, like, what a life.
>> Farz: Yeah, you gotta. You gotta, like, at some point, it's like quality of life has to count for something, you know? yeah, if I was that, if I was in that position, I don't know. I don't. I don't think I would. I don't know.
>> Taylor: Yeah, it's hard. So the March of Dimes continues to be an organization. It helps with babies worldwide. They help with measles and rubella neonatal care. They were really, big in promoting folic acid, which is like a vitamin that you take when you're pregnant. And they, you know, found that that was really helpful to pregnancies and to babies. And so they were part of that big campaign. the problem right now is the polio vaccine is sort of a victim of your own success kind of thing. And I was thinking about it, like, why am I paying Terminix so much money to come to my house every Month. I don't have any bugs. When like the reason I don't have any bugs is because I pay Terminix so much money every month. You know, that's actually what I was.
>> Farz: Going to ask you was do we even if it's been eradicated, do we even need.
>> Taylor: We do. Yeah. Because it's not, it's not like it's gone from like the world. Like it could be, it could exist. We just don't get it anymore, you know?
>> Farz: Yeah.
>> Taylor: So it's like still out there. So, there's also like misinformation, obviously. Like RFK said that it caused cancer. It does not. At one point someone suggested that it was a reason that we have HIV and aids because of the monkey testing. That, that brought it over into like human laboratories, which is also not true. but it works. And we know that it works because there's no polio. So we have to keep doing it. Like having the bug guy come over. But people won't get polio anymore.
>> Farz: My bug guy's coming over tomorrow actually.
How many cookies? How many vaccines do your kids get? Like how many
>> Taylor: How many cookies?
>> Farz: How many like for your kids? Like how many vaccines do they get?
>> Taylor: I don't know. A lot. They get a lot when they're babies. I mean the worst part honestly is that they put a grown up sized band aid on their legs and their legs are like the size of your like wrist, you know, so like they're chunky little baby thigh is this huge ass band aid on it and you to rip it off. And they get so sad whenever.
>> Farz: I just took Luna to get her annual checkup and this is where I'm like, not totally on the vaccine train is where they're like, yeah, we're going to give her, we're to administer like four vaccines to her. And I'm like, no, like, like her body.
>> Taylor: No, I'm getting. No, it's fine. Get it over with. They don't interact with each other. They're different things. I'd rather not four separate times to get shots. It doesn't matter. You're.
>> Farz: You're changing the body chemistry so many.
>> Taylor: Times, but they don't interact with each other. It's different. I mean, I'm okay with it. You can do whatever you want to do, but I think you should do it all the same time. and that is my story.
>> Farz: I never knew my parents inject me with lip polio. Like I. You probably should have a word with them.
>> Taylor: Yeah, you drank it. It was a little thing in your mouth and that's it. You didn't believe anymore. I also, for this episode, recorded a bonus episode with my dad and recorded this morning. And I will publish that as a separate thing, because my dad remembers the day that you stood in line and got the polio vaccine and the trigger cube, and then no one had to worry about it anymore.
>> Farz: That's incredible.
>> Taylor: So we talked about it. Yeah. So it's fun. He told me about waiting in line, getting the sugar cube. My grandma brought their birth certificates wrote down in a notebook. You'll hear it. I'll post it.
>> Farz: It also realizes, like, how prevalent FDR is. And, like, at first I thought how prevalent he is or his family is, in our stories. And, And then I was like, actually, he's kind of like that in every story because he was president. The most consequential time in human history. I know it was like, the Great depression, World War II, polio, every, like, huge thing.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: He was a part of.
>> Taylor: I also think it ties so into the thing that we say all the time about how dynasties are so difficult because, like, darn Roosevelt kids now, you know, like, none of them were close to being president because you always end up with kids who, like, can't do it. So it's like he was just, like an outlier, you know, like, his family was rich, but he was, like, exceptional.
>> Farz: Yeah. Ah, that's kind of. I think that's just how it is with every.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: can you imagine? Like, I. I shouldn't talk. I shouldn't talk shit about someone so young. But I have thought about, like, Baron Trump, and it's like, how do you not become, like, actual, like, monster? It's got to be impossible. Like, raised is royalty from, like, birth. Like, it's.
>> Taylor: It's.
>> Farz: Yeah. Like, first. First, like, wealth royalty, and then actual, like, basically, like, real, like, royalty. Royalty. It can't produce a good human. I don't know. Maybe again, the kid's, like, 18 years old. I shouldn't talk about him. But still, I still know how you can be normal in that situation.
>> Taylor: Yeah. Ridiculous. cool.
You should let your kids know I was a huge Sonic fan on Sega Genesis
Well, that's all I have. And I have to go because we're going to the movies.
>> Farz: What are you seeing?
>> Taylor: Sonic 3.
>> Farz: This should be fun.
>> Taylor: It should be fun. The first two are great.
>> Farz: You should let your kids know I was a huge Sonic fan on, Sega Genesis. Sega Genesis was. Yeah.
>> Taylor: You probably have it at the. At the dentist we go to with them. They have, like, an old Arcadian that has the Sega. The Sonic 2 on it. It's so fun that was the best game.
>> Farz: That was. That was. You bought a Sega Genesis. You bought for, for Sonic. You bought, N64 for, GoldenEye. Those are rules.
>> Taylor: That's it.
>> Farz: So. Okay, cool. Well, thanks for sharing. Go enjoy the film. And, and I'll, Yeah, we'll. We'll go ahead and, Well, whatever. We can do our check ins after this. But anyways, thank you for sharing.
>> Taylor: Thank you, everyone. Please tell your friends, we are trying to figure out how to grow in 2025 so far. Going to have meetings about it. Tell your friends.
>> Farz: Tell your friends. We'd appreciate it.
>> Taylor: Doomed to fall apart on all social medias.
>> Farz: Sweet. Cool.