User:Mr. Ibrahem/Polio
Medical condition / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Polio, short for poliomyelitis, is an infectious disease caused by the poliovirus.[1] In about 0.5 percent of cases, there is muscle weakness resulting in an inability to move.[1] This can occur over a few hours to a few days.[1][3] The weakness most often involves the legs, but may less commonly involve the muscles of the head, neck and diaphragm.[1] Many people fully recover.[1] In those with muscle weakness, about 2 to 5 percent of children and 15 to 30 percent of adults die.[1] For all those infected, in up to 70 percent of infections there are no symptoms.[1] Another 25 percent of people have minor symptoms such as fever and a sore throat, and up to 5 percent have headache, neck stiffness and pains in the arms and legs.[1][3] These people are usually back to normal within one or two weeks.[1] Years after recovery, post-polio syndrome may occur, with a slow development of muscle weakness similar to that which the person had during the initial infection.[2]
Polio | |
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Other names | Poliomyelitis, infantile paralysis |
A man with a smaller right leg due to poliomyelitis | |
Pronunciation | |
Specialty | Neurology, infectious disease |
Symptoms | Muscle weakness resulting in an inability to move[1] |
Complications | Post-polio syndrome[2] |
Usual onset | Few hours to days[1][3] |
Causes | Poliovirus spread by fecal-oral route[1] |
Diagnostic method | Finding the virus in the feces or antibodies in the blood[1] |
Prevention | Polio vaccine[3] |
Treatment | Supportive care[3] |
Frequency | 176 wild cases (2019)[4] |
Poliovirus is usually spread from person to person through infected fecal matter entering the mouth.[1] It may also be spread by food or water containing human feces and less commonly from infected saliva.[1][3] Those who are infected may spread the disease for up to six weeks even if no symptoms are present.[1] The disease may be diagnosed by finding the virus in the feces or detecting antibodies against it in the blood.[1] The disease occurs naturally only in humans.[1]
The disease is preventable with the polio vaccine; however, multiple doses are required for it to be effective.[3] The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends polio vaccination boosters for travelers and those who live in countries where the disease is occurring.[5] Once infected there is no specific treatment.[3] In 2018, there were 33 cases of wild polio and 104 cases of vaccine-derived polio.[4] This is down from 350,000 wild cases in 1988.[3] In 2018, the wild disease was spread between people only in Afghanistan and Pakistan.[4] In 2019 there were 175 cases of wild polio and 364 cases of vaccine-derived polio.[6]
Poliomyelitis has existed for thousands of years, with depictions of the disease in ancient art.[1] The disease was first recognized as a distinct condition by the English physician Michael Underwood in 1789.[1] The virus that causes it was first identified in 1908 by the Austrian immunologist Karl Landsteiner and his assistant, Erwin Popper.[7] Major outbreaks started to occur in the late 19th century in Europe and the United States.[1] In the 20th century it became one of the most worrying childhood diseases in these areas.[8] The first polio vaccine was developed in the 1950s by Jonas Salk and soon after, Albert Sabin developed an oral vaccine.[9]