RadioRotary

In 1954 when she was 6 months old, Louise Rourke contracted polio, also known as infantile paralysis. Initially she lost the power of moving either leg or her left arm, although her left side eventually recovered with medical help supplied in part by the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis (the March of Dimes). After several corrective surgeries, she was able to walk with the aid of a brace on her right leg. By the time she was a teenager, she could walk without the brace, but age caught up to her in 2007 and she needed the brace once more. Like some other polio survivors, she found that swimming was excellent exercise, although her right leg just dangled in the water. Living on the shore of 32-mile-long Lake George in upstate New York, she learned of women who had swum the entire length of the lake, so she conceived of a plan to earn money for polio eradication by swimming the length of Lake George herself. This RadioRotary program tells how she got through the task and what she accomplished for polio eradication, which became multiplied by a factor of 3 by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Learn more:

Polio: https://www.cdc.gov/polio/about/index.htm

End Polio Now: https://www.endpolio.org/

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation: https://www.gatesfoundation.org/what-we-do/global-development/polio

Lake George: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_George_(New_York)

Northern Lake George Rotary Club: https://northernlakegeorgerotary.wordpress.com/

CATEGORIES

Global Polio Initiative

PolioPlus

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