Polio: It's Only a Plane Ride Away.

A chat about Rotary’s role in polio eradication with Carol Pandak, the Director of PolioPlus for Rotary International

Emanuel (Manny) Poznanski was born in Israel, where he contracted paralytic polio when he was 4 months old. He said his mother rushed him on a plane to the U.S. to save his life.

Let me tell you how Santa and I came together 63 years ago.

As an active 10 year old, living in a tight knit community in East Detroit, Roger enjoyed the summer of 1947 playing with his friends in the neighborhood. Soon the summer fun came to a harsh end with the spread of polio.

In 1949, the year I was hit by the poliovirus, 42,000 cases of polio were reported in the United States and 2,720 people died, most of them children.