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Article
August 1917

EPIDEMIOLOGIC DATA IN THE POLIOMYELITIS EPIDEMIC IN NEW YORK STATE

Author Affiliations

Deputy Commissioner, New York State Department of Health ALBANY, N. Y.

Am J Dis Child. 1917;14(2):69-79. doi:10.1001/archpedi.1917.01910080002001
Abstract

While it cannot be said that any really new facts have been established regarding poliomyelitis as the result of last summer's great epidemic, certain more or less widely accepted opinions concerning the periods of infectivity, the age and sex incidence and the behavior of the disease under urban and rural conditions of living have been placed on a more solid scientific footing. I shall purposely omit statistical results of serum treatment, as I do not believe it possible at present to pronounce, a definite opinion as to its value.

ORIGIN, SPREAD AND MAGNITUDE OF THE EPIDEMIC  The number of cases of poliomyelitis reported in New York State during the first five months of 1916 (forty-one) was quite low; in fact, below normal, affording no intimation of the sudden flare-up that was to follow. The general invasion of the state seems to have come from the Borough' of Brooklyn, where the

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