Polio, or Infantile Paralysis has been infecting humans since the beginning of recorded history. In the early 20th century, the disease became a major epidemic in the United States, returning every summer to infect thousands of children across the country. In the 1950s the National Foundation on Infantile Paralysis, today the March of Dimes, made a concentrated effort to develop a vaccine against the disease. Thanks to Dr. Jonas Salk, by 1979 the virus was totally eliminated in the United States.
