Inventions & Discoveries · Medicine and health
Polio vaccine
Polio vaccines prevent poliomyelitis and come in two types, an inactivated virus given by injection and a weakened virus given by mouth; Hilary Koprowski first tested a live, attenuated oral vaccine successfully in New York in 1950. Jonas Salk's injected vaccine was announced as effective in 1955, after a field trial involving 1.8 million children, and Albert Sabin's oral vaccine came into commercial use in 1961. Since a global eradication effort began in 1988, cases have fallen from an estimated 350,000 a year to 33 in 2018.
On the inventions tree
- First known
- 1950
- Where
- New York
- Credited to
- Hilary Koprowski · Jonas Salk · Albert Sabin · United States
NoteJonas Salk’s injected vaccine was shown effective in 1955; earlier vaccines of 1934–1935 were withdrawn.
Built onVaccination1796
See also
Cite this entry
- APA
- The Epoch Institute. (2026). Polio vaccine. In The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/polio-vaccine
- MLA
- “Polio vaccine.” The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia, The Epoch Institute, 2026, https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/polio-vaccine. Accessed .
- Chicago
- The Epoch Institute. “Polio vaccine.” The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. 2026. https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/polio-vaccine.
- Harvard
- The Epoch Institute (2026) ‘Polio vaccine’, The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. Available at: https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/polio-vaccine (Accessed: ).
Last reviewed October 2026Random entry ↻