There has never been a worse time to be a polio virus. This week health authorities were put on alert after sewage samples suggested a vaccine-derived form of the virus was circulating in Britain. It felt like the 1970s were back, not just economically but virologically too.
Nothing, though, could be further from the truth. For the wild virus, the virus that has been a constant, paralysing companion of humanity throughout history, far from being resurgent, things are looking terminal.
So much so that in spite of the news this week, scientists think we could be on the cusp of the greatest global health achievement since the eradication of smallpox: the extinction of a disease.
“We are very, very close,” says Dr Kathleen O’Reilly, from
