Rotary campaigns to eradicate polio

Sisters Rotary set up an Emerson Respirator, also known as an iron lung, in front of Ray's Food Place on Saturday, October 24, to raise awareness - and funds - for Pennies for Polio.

The iron lung was invented to help people breathe who were crippled with the disease. Sisters is the first community to use the lung to create awareness about polio.

Rotary restored the iron lung to help with their fundraising efforts to match a $100 million donation made to Rotary International by the Melinda and Bill Gates Foundation. It's Sisters Rotary's first public anti-polio fundraiser.

"Heretofore Rotarians have donated to polio on their own. All the doctors and nurses who administer the vaccines and educate the public are also all volunteers." said Rotarian Barbara Turner.

Several donors who came by Ray's had their own polio and iron lung stories.

"I was in an iron lung for seventeen months twenty-one years ago in Redding, California," said Jim Willis, now an Oregon resident. "It wasn't pleasant, but it was better than dying. I was doing 79 mph and was hit sideways by another driver. I didn't have polio, but I had a pen cage in my neck, they drilled holes in my ribs and I had screws in my head."

Willis spoke like an expert about the iron lung's features.

"The jar of water on the outside sends vapors inside the chamber. I also had two tubes in my nose constantly pumping in oxygen," he said.

Local resident Brenda Krause had polio and was placed in an oxygen tent, but didn't have to go into an iron lung.

"I was six years old and in an oxygen tent," she said. "I remember hearing the doctor talk with my parents. The doctor said if I didn't start breathing normally within five minutes he would have no choice but to put me in an iron lung."

Even at her young age, she had seen the iron lung and knew what it meant to be confined inside the device. The lung, which looks like a large metal tube, houses your entire body. There are openings in the side, which remain closed most of the time, but are opened so medical staff can reach in and turn the patient. Only your head sticks out.

"I started praying not to have to go in the iron lung. Miraculously my condition improved in the next five minutes and I didn't have to use it. Doctors said I wouldn't be able to drive or have children, and I have done both," Krause said.

For those with polio, just one drop of fluid, an oral vaccine, provides protection from catching the disease.

Rotary volunteers in the health care profession travel to countries where the epidemic is still prevalent to administer the liquid drops. Keeping the medication chilled in remote rural locations is just one challenge for the administrators. Education is also key.

"In some of these countries they are leery of the vaccine, and education is important," said Kathryn Johnson, president of Sisters Rotary.

"Rotary has contributed to make the world 99 percent polio-free. We have 1.2 million members worldwide," said Rotary Polio Eradication Chair Harriett Schloer.

Pennies for Polio is a district-wide effort.