Research Arc 2: Political Contexts of Polio and Covid
The other important area of context that should be understood when analyzing polio and covid are the political contexts. Political leaders of a country are often looked to during times of crisis, and it is their responses and actions that can unite its citizens, or divide them. For polio, the political contexts largely aimed to unite the people of America and encourage them. One of America’s presidents himself was diagnosed with polio in 1921: Franklin Delano Roosevelt. As a victim to the disease and thus able to empathize with other adults and children who contracted the disease, Roosevelt focused on the chase to find a treatment for polio when he became president in 1933. According to Robert Dorfman, a surgeon at Northwestern, and his article published in the Canadian Bulletin of Medical History, Roosevelt was the “first American president to make a disease "his disease." His advisors made much of his transformation from polio victim to polio patron and featured his name, voice, and body in fundraising” (Dorfman). This framing of polio that Roosevelt presented was a key attitude in shaping the public’s views towards polio. Not only did Roosevelt start a rehabilitation foundation center in Warm Springs, Georgia, but he also founded the NFIP to fund research for a polio cure (Dorfman). Roosevelt’s efforts to spread awareness and actively battle the disease showed the public not only that he took polio and the safety of American citizens very seriously, but that polio could be treated and overcome. Roosevelt served to be a beacon of hope for the American public in this way. By the time the Salk vaccine emerged, Dwight D. Eisenhower was in charge of the country and debates within the government arose on how to best distribute the vaccine. The idea of ‘socialized medicine’ arose, the phrase appearing in an article by Government Executive featuring Harvard historian Jill Lepore, is best described as a refusal of the federal government to mandate and distribute medicine over the fear of the government becoming authoritarian with such powers (Abramson). In a statement released by Eisenhower himself at the end of May 1955, he announced that vaccine distribution powers would be given to individual states. In addition, his statement also explained the safety of the vaccine, encouraged children to receive all three doses of the vaccine, method of distribution of vaccines to the most susceptible first, legislation to allocate funds to the states to provide free vaccinations, and his personal hope for polio eradication (Eisenhower). As a result, by July 1955, just two months after Eisenhower’s statement, four million children received their vaccinations (Abramson). Both Eisenhower and Roosevelt set examples of compassionate presidents that took care in addressing the national crisis beginning with action from the government. Their encouragement united the American people more than it divided them.
The political context of covid, on the other hand, was (and still is) filled with division. Based on a survey from March 2021, according to an article published in The Lancet, spearheaded by Yale School of Medicine Professor Saad Omer, 49% of males affiliated with the Republican party said they would not vaccinate, while only 6% of males affiliated with the Democratic party would choose not to vaccinate. Other research studies, the article writes, have concluded that political polarization has damaged the potential of America’s response to the health crisis (Omer). What is contributing to this divide? An article by The Atlantic holds some of the answers: President Donald Trump’s dishonesty about the virus. Starting from the beginning of 2020 up to November 2020, the article tracks each false claim that Trump made about the coronavirus. These include instances and quotes such as on February 27, he claimed “It’s going to disappear. One day, it’s like a miracle–it will disappear.” He made other similar claims downplaying the severity and increasing daily covid cases, making general statements about covid cases dropping extremely low when they were, in fact, either surging or plateauing, and how 99% of covid cases were harmless, which was disproved by the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Anthony Fauci. Trump also falsely cited a CDC study and claimed that 85% of mask-wearers would still catch the virus. The list goes on (Paz). Trump’s continuous neglect to treat covid as a national health crisis and hailing the virus to be less severe than it was in reality, led to many of his supporters echoing his attitude and refusing to vaccinate. Stacy Wood, in her journal article in the New England Journal of Medicine, explains how a main factor in choosing to wear facemasks was associated with political affiliation. Given the earlier-mentioned false claims that Trump made about masks, it supports Wood’s claim about political association because those who were less likely to vaccinate were more likely in support of not wearing masks, from the social contexts in the previous section (Hotez). Other political explanations for the division surrounding covid vaccinations is the mistrust that Americans have in their government. Senior scientist Frank Newport with data company Gallup writes that the low levels of trust in the government could have impacted the effects of covid, backed up by a CNBC poll and Census Bureau data that showed low levels of trust in the government was one of the top reasons to refuse a vaccine. “It is plausible to assume,” Newport writes, “that Americans' trust in government is at least partially related to their willingness to adhere to government vaccine recommendations.” The choice of many states run by democratic governors to lift their state mask mandate is an example of distrust of the federal government, which still recommends masks according to the CDC guidelines, Newport also claims (Newport). The federal government must have earned this low trust, through failing to meet demands or respond quickly to different emergencies and responsibilities. As a result, the public is less inclined to trust the government, and some people may even actively go against their recommendations. Regarding covid, this means that recommendations to social distance, wear masks, and get vaccinated will be met with resistance from citizens who don’t trust the government’s capacity to make the right decisions. The distrust, paired with flawed administration, creates a general negative attitude for its citizens and dissuades them from wanting to be vaccinated.
The political context of covid, on the other hand, was (and still is) filled with division. Based on a survey from March 2021, according to an article published in The Lancet, spearheaded by Yale School of Medicine Professor Saad Omer, 49% of males affiliated with the Republican party said they would not vaccinate, while only 6% of males affiliated with the Democratic party would choose not to vaccinate. Other research studies, the article writes, have concluded that political polarization has damaged the potential of America’s response to the health crisis (Omer). What is contributing to this divide? An article by The Atlantic holds some of the answers: President Donald Trump’s dishonesty about the virus. Starting from the beginning of 2020 up to November 2020, the article tracks each false claim that Trump made about the coronavirus. These include instances and quotes such as on February 27, he claimed “It’s going to disappear. One day, it’s like a miracle–it will disappear.” He made other similar claims downplaying the severity and increasing daily covid cases, making general statements about covid cases dropping extremely low when they were, in fact, either surging or plateauing, and how 99% of covid cases were harmless, which was disproved by the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Anthony Fauci. Trump also falsely cited a CDC study and claimed that 85% of mask-wearers would still catch the virus. The list goes on (Paz). Trump’s continuous neglect to treat covid as a national health crisis and hailing the virus to be less severe than it was in reality, led to many of his supporters echoing his attitude and refusing to vaccinate. Stacy Wood, in her journal article in the New England Journal of Medicine, explains how a main factor in choosing to wear facemasks was associated with political affiliation. Given the earlier-mentioned false claims that Trump made about masks, it supports Wood’s claim about political association because those who were less likely to vaccinate were more likely in support of not wearing masks, from the social contexts in the previous section (Hotez). Other political explanations for the division surrounding covid vaccinations is the mistrust that Americans have in their government. Senior scientist Frank Newport with data company Gallup writes that the low levels of trust in the government could have impacted the effects of covid, backed up by a CNBC poll and Census Bureau data that showed low levels of trust in the government was one of the top reasons to refuse a vaccine. “It is plausible to assume,” Newport writes, “that Americans' trust in government is at least partially related to their willingness to adhere to government vaccine recommendations.” The choice of many states run by democratic governors to lift their state mask mandate is an example of distrust of the federal government, which still recommends masks according to the CDC guidelines, Newport also claims (Newport). The federal government must have earned this low trust, through failing to meet demands or respond quickly to different emergencies and responsibilities. As a result, the public is less inclined to trust the government, and some people may even actively go against their recommendations. Regarding covid, this means that recommendations to social distance, wear masks, and get vaccinated will be met with resistance from citizens who don’t trust the government’s capacity to make the right decisions. The distrust, paired with flawed administration, creates a general negative attitude for its citizens and dissuades them from wanting to be vaccinated.
In Progress Works Cited
Abramson, Mark. "History Does Repeat Itself: Lessons from the Polio Vaccine." Government Executive, 21 July 2020, www.govexec.com/management/2020/07/history-does-repeat-itself-lessons-polio-vaccine/167068/.
Brink, Susan. "Can't Help Falling In Love With A Vaccine: How Polio Campaign Beat Vaccine Hesitancy." NPR.org, 3 May 2021, www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/05/03/988756973/cant-help-falling-in-love-with-a-vaccine-how-polio-campaign-beat-vaccine-hesitan.
CDC. "COVID Data Tracker." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 28 Mar. 2020, covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#demographics.
CDC. "COVID Data Tracker." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 28 Mar. 2020, covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#trends_totalcases_select_00.
Clausen, John A., et al. "Parent Attitudes Toward Participation of Their Children in Polio Vaccine Trials." American Journal of Public Health and the Nations Health, vol. 44, no. 12, 1954, pp. 1526-1536. https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/pdf/10.2105/AJPH.44.12.1526
Conis, Elena. "Vaccination Resistance in Historical Perspective." Organization of American Historians, www.oah.org/tah/issues/2015/august/vaccination-resistance/.
Deliso, Meredith. "What's Fueling COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy in Young Adults?" ABC News, 16 July 2021, abcnews.go.com/Health/young-adults-remain-hesitant-covid-19-vaccine/story?id=78828317.
Dorfman, Robert G., et al. "Dr. Polio: Revisiting FDR's Medical Legacy." Canadian Bulletin of Medical History, vol. 35 no. 1, 2018, p. 160-192. Project MUSE muse.jhu.edu/article/695810.
Eisenhower, Dwight. "Statement by the President on the Polio Vaccine Situation." The American Presidency Project, 31 May 1955, www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/statement-the-president-the-polio-vaccine-situation.
Hotez, Peter J. "COVID19 meets the antivaccine movement." Microbes and Infection, vol. 22, no. 4-5, 2020, pp. 162-164.
"Immunization." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 21 Oct. 2022, www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/immunize.htm#:~:text=Polio%20(3%2B%20doses)%3A%2092.5,(1%2B%20doses)%3A%2090.8%25.
Kuznetsova L. COVID-19: The World Community Expects the World Health Organization to Play a Stronger Leadership and Coordination Role in Pandemics Control. Front Public Health. 2020 Sep 8;8:470. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2020.00470. PMID: 33014970; PMCID: PMC7505920.
Larsen, Dawn. "The March of Dimes and Polio: Lessons in Vaccine Advocacy for Health Educators." American Journal of Health Education, vol. 43, no. 1, Jan. 2012, pp. 47-54, eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ978264. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ978264.pdf
Lee, Bruce Y. "Did Marjorie Taylor Greene Compare Polio And Covid-19 Vaccines? Here’s The Problem." Forbes, 21 Dec. 2021, www.forbes.com/sites/brucelee/2021/12/21/did-marjorie-taylor-greene-compare-polio-and-covid-19-vaccines-heres-the-problem/?sh=57caa4551033.
Meyers, K., Thomasson, M.A. Can pandemics affect educational attainment? Evidence from the polio epidemic of 1916. Cliometrica 15, 231–265 (2021). https://doi-org.libproxy.berkeley.edu/10.1007/s11698-020-00212-3
Moran, Padraig. "Polio Vaccine Set off Wave of Relief, and a Wave of Resistance. COVID-19 Era May Be Similar, Says Jill Lepore." CBC, 15 Dec. 2020, https://www.cbc.ca/radio/thecurrent/the-current-for-june-9-2020-1.5604421/polio-vaccine-set-off-wave-of-relief-and-a-wave-of-resistance-covid-19-era-may-be-similar-says-jill-lepore-1.5604925#:~:text=wave%20of%20resistance.-,COVID%2D19%20era%20may%20be%20similar%2C%20says%20Jill%20Lepore,the%20era%20of%20COVID%2D19.
Omer, Saad B., et al. "Promoting COVID-19 vaccine acceptance: recommendations from the Lancet Commission on Vaccine Refusal, Acceptance, and Demand in the USA." The Lancet, vol. 398, no. 10317, 2021, pp. 2186-2192. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(21)02507-1
Oshinsky, David M.. Polio : An American Story, Oxford University Press, Incorporated, 2005. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/berkeley-ebooks/detail.action?docID=279565.
Paz, Christian. "All the President’s Lies About the Coronavirus." The Atlantic, 23 Feb. 2021, www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/11/trumps-lies-about-coronavirus/608647/.
Schupmann, Will D. "Human Experimentation in Public Schools: How Schools Served as Sites of Vaccine Trials in the 20th Century." American Journal of Public Health, vol. 108, no. 8, 2018, pp. 1015-1022. https://repository.upenn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1084&context=phr
Scientific American. "Paranoid Gossip About Polio Vaccine." Scientific American, 13 Apr. 2020, www.scientificamerican.com/article/paranoid-gossip-about-polio-vaccine/.
Steinberg, Neil. "Americans Were Scared of Polio Vaccines Too." Chicago Sun-Times, 31 Aug. 2021, chicago.suntimes.com/columnists/2021/8/31/22626790/coronavirus-vaccine-anti-vaxxers-polio-winchell-steinberg.
Stephen E. Mawdsley (2016) ‘Salk Hops’: Teen Health Activism and the Fight against Polio, 1955 – 1960, Cultural and Social History, 13:2, 249-265, DOI: 10.1080/14780038.2016.1145393
Thompson, Kimberly M., and Radboud J.Duintjer Tebbens. “Retrospective Cost-Effectiveness Analyses for Polio Vaccination in the United States.” Risk Analysis: An International Journal, vol. 26, no. 6, Dec. 2006, pp. 1423–40. EBSCOhost, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1539-6924.2006.00831.x.
Wang, Xiangyu et al. “Understanding the spread of COVID-19 misinformation on social media: The effects of topics and a political leader's nudge.” Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology vol. 73,5 (2022): 726-737. doi:10.1002/asi.24576
Yeracaris, Constantine A. “The Acceptance of Polio Vaccine: An Hypothesis.” The American Catholic Sociological Review, vol. 22, no. 4, 1961, pp. 299–305. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/3708037. Accessed 21 Oct. 2022.
Brink, Susan. "Can't Help Falling In Love With A Vaccine: How Polio Campaign Beat Vaccine Hesitancy." NPR.org, 3 May 2021, www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/05/03/988756973/cant-help-falling-in-love-with-a-vaccine-how-polio-campaign-beat-vaccine-hesitan.
CDC. "COVID Data Tracker." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 28 Mar. 2020, covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#demographics.
CDC. "COVID Data Tracker." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 28 Mar. 2020, covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#trends_totalcases_select_00.
Clausen, John A., et al. "Parent Attitudes Toward Participation of Their Children in Polio Vaccine Trials." American Journal of Public Health and the Nations Health, vol. 44, no. 12, 1954, pp. 1526-1536. https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/pdf/10.2105/AJPH.44.12.1526
Conis, Elena. "Vaccination Resistance in Historical Perspective." Organization of American Historians, www.oah.org/tah/issues/2015/august/vaccination-resistance/.
Deliso, Meredith. "What's Fueling COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy in Young Adults?" ABC News, 16 July 2021, abcnews.go.com/Health/young-adults-remain-hesitant-covid-19-vaccine/story?id=78828317.
Dorfman, Robert G., et al. "Dr. Polio: Revisiting FDR's Medical Legacy." Canadian Bulletin of Medical History, vol. 35 no. 1, 2018, p. 160-192. Project MUSE muse.jhu.edu/article/695810.
Eisenhower, Dwight. "Statement by the President on the Polio Vaccine Situation." The American Presidency Project, 31 May 1955, www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/statement-the-president-the-polio-vaccine-situation.
Hotez, Peter J. "COVID19 meets the antivaccine movement." Microbes and Infection, vol. 22, no. 4-5, 2020, pp. 162-164.
"Immunization." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 21 Oct. 2022, www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/immunize.htm#:~:text=Polio%20(3%2B%20doses)%3A%2092.5,(1%2B%20doses)%3A%2090.8%25.
Kuznetsova L. COVID-19: The World Community Expects the World Health Organization to Play a Stronger Leadership and Coordination Role in Pandemics Control. Front Public Health. 2020 Sep 8;8:470. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2020.00470. PMID: 33014970; PMCID: PMC7505920.
Larsen, Dawn. "The March of Dimes and Polio: Lessons in Vaccine Advocacy for Health Educators." American Journal of Health Education, vol. 43, no. 1, Jan. 2012, pp. 47-54, eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ978264. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ978264.pdf
Lee, Bruce Y. "Did Marjorie Taylor Greene Compare Polio And Covid-19 Vaccines? Here’s The Problem." Forbes, 21 Dec. 2021, www.forbes.com/sites/brucelee/2021/12/21/did-marjorie-taylor-greene-compare-polio-and-covid-19-vaccines-heres-the-problem/?sh=57caa4551033.
Meyers, K., Thomasson, M.A. Can pandemics affect educational attainment? Evidence from the polio epidemic of 1916. Cliometrica 15, 231–265 (2021). https://doi-org.libproxy.berkeley.edu/10.1007/s11698-020-00212-3
Moran, Padraig. "Polio Vaccine Set off Wave of Relief, and a Wave of Resistance. COVID-19 Era May Be Similar, Says Jill Lepore." CBC, 15 Dec. 2020, https://www.cbc.ca/radio/thecurrent/the-current-for-june-9-2020-1.5604421/polio-vaccine-set-off-wave-of-relief-and-a-wave-of-resistance-covid-19-era-may-be-similar-says-jill-lepore-1.5604925#:~:text=wave%20of%20resistance.-,COVID%2D19%20era%20may%20be%20similar%2C%20says%20Jill%20Lepore,the%20era%20of%20COVID%2D19.
Omer, Saad B., et al. "Promoting COVID-19 vaccine acceptance: recommendations from the Lancet Commission on Vaccine Refusal, Acceptance, and Demand in the USA." The Lancet, vol. 398, no. 10317, 2021, pp. 2186-2192. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(21)02507-1
Oshinsky, David M.. Polio : An American Story, Oxford University Press, Incorporated, 2005. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/berkeley-ebooks/detail.action?docID=279565.
Paz, Christian. "All the President’s Lies About the Coronavirus." The Atlantic, 23 Feb. 2021, www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/11/trumps-lies-about-coronavirus/608647/.
Schupmann, Will D. "Human Experimentation in Public Schools: How Schools Served as Sites of Vaccine Trials in the 20th Century." American Journal of Public Health, vol. 108, no. 8, 2018, pp. 1015-1022. https://repository.upenn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1084&context=phr
Scientific American. "Paranoid Gossip About Polio Vaccine." Scientific American, 13 Apr. 2020, www.scientificamerican.com/article/paranoid-gossip-about-polio-vaccine/.
Steinberg, Neil. "Americans Were Scared of Polio Vaccines Too." Chicago Sun-Times, 31 Aug. 2021, chicago.suntimes.com/columnists/2021/8/31/22626790/coronavirus-vaccine-anti-vaxxers-polio-winchell-steinberg.
Stephen E. Mawdsley (2016) ‘Salk Hops’: Teen Health Activism and the Fight against Polio, 1955 – 1960, Cultural and Social History, 13:2, 249-265, DOI: 10.1080/14780038.2016.1145393
Thompson, Kimberly M., and Radboud J.Duintjer Tebbens. “Retrospective Cost-Effectiveness Analyses for Polio Vaccination in the United States.” Risk Analysis: An International Journal, vol. 26, no. 6, Dec. 2006, pp. 1423–40. EBSCOhost, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1539-6924.2006.00831.x.
Wang, Xiangyu et al. “Understanding the spread of COVID-19 misinformation on social media: The effects of topics and a political leader's nudge.” Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology vol. 73,5 (2022): 726-737. doi:10.1002/asi.24576
Yeracaris, Constantine A. “The Acceptance of Polio Vaccine: An Hypothesis.” The American Catholic Sociological Review, vol. 22, no. 4, 1961, pp. 299–305. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/3708037. Accessed 21 Oct. 2022.