Vaccine Exemption Debate Sparks Memories For Mainers Who Survived Polio

What’s comforting, says Crocker, is that vaccination has meant no members with new cases of polio are joining the group. (Credit Patty Wight/Maine Public)

In less than two weeks, Mainers will cast their votes on a referendum that seeks to repeal a new law that removes religious and philosophical exemptions for vaccines.

Rates of non-medical exemptions continue to rise in Maine, and they are currently more than double the national average. But whether successful or not, the repeal effort is stoking the memories of polio survivors who lived through a time when immunizations weren’t available for certain diseases.

Sitting at her dining room table in West Gardiner, 72-year old Ann Crocker sifts through a pile of photos from her childhood.

“This was a picture of me showing my family on that Sunday, ‘Here look! I can take my first step.'” Crocker was taking that step after being seriously ill. “I had polio when I had just turned five. Three years before the Salk vaccine came out.”

Read the rest of this story at Maine Public’s website.