Polio survivors fight for proper treatment of post-polio syndrome

'We were just cut loose': Polio survivors struggle as PPS often dismissed, misdiagnosed

Donna Carreiro · CBC News

The last remaining survivors of North America's worst polio epidemic say they are living out its grim legacy — post-polio syndrome — with a medical community that doesn't know enough about the syndrome or the epidemic that caused it.

"I tell a doctor I had polio as a child, he'll just look at me with a blank stare, like 'so what?'" Altona resident Al Giesbrecht said. "You might as well call it X-Y-Z disease because it has no meaning."

Giesbrecht, who contracted polio in 1952, is one of an estimated 16,000 remaining survivors across Canada living with post-polio syndrome, a neurological disorder that targets up to 60 per cent of polio survivors decades after their original bout with the virus.

Some symptoms are inconvenient, like the midday fatigue dubbed the "polio wall." Others are life threatening, like the inability to swallow which leads to choking, even on one's own saliva.

"I have this constant fear that one day I am going to be alone at my table and I'll choke to death," Giesbrecht said. "I've almost strangled myself on a crust of bread."

To read the complete article and watch accompanying video, click the button below.