Observations on the Epidemiology of Poliomyelitis: From 1950 Baltimore Epidemic

Abstract

A high incidence of poliomyelitis in Baltimore in 1950 provided an opportunity for the study of the epidemiology of this disease in an urban center. Evidence is found in support of the person-to-person contact principle as the basis of the mode of spread of the disease. Higher rates among white persons, age displacement to the older ages with the passage of several decades, and the differential attack sequence in time of defined urban areas, are all apparently consistent with person-to-person contact and transmission.