New polio website takes historical approach

IT | Stefan Marseglia | 11 Mar 2010

The British Polio Fellowship has created a new website aimed at documenting the history of polio to help raise awareness of the disease.

Launched earlier this week, it aims to act as a “lasting record” of the effects polio has had to society and help educate future generations on the issues their predecessors may have experienced.

Taking 675 hours to complete, and with funding from the Heritage Lottery, Fellowship member Leo Redpath created the website on a voluntary basis in liaison with the Fellowship’s marketing team.

The site cost £48,000 to create, and includes interviews, audio clips and photographs of Fellowship members.

“It took six months to conduct the interviews, since a project worker travelled to visit people all over the country,” said Dr John Hooper, chief executive of the British Polio Fellowship.

“At each of our six Super Forums in 2009 that were held, we held a history corner and asked people to bring memorabilia. As a result we managed to obtain the diary of Vera Kennedy and many of the photographs.”

The website also features contributions in the format of historical diary entries from consultant neurologists who themselves have diagnosed and helped treat the virus.

“We also hope that the website will prove to be an important tool for GPs in helping to diagnose PPS,” said Hooper.

While the website has no specific demographic, the Fellowship hopes that it will be visited by people who have polio alongside those who wish to learn more, want to remember the epidemics of the last century, as well as social historians.

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