Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-m6dg7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T09:44:52.921Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Differences in Polio Mortality by Socioeconomic Status in Two Southern Ontario Counties, 1900–1937

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 April 2017

Heather T. Battles
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The collective polio literature of the mid-twentieth century developed a model centered on age at infection. In this model, known as the hygiene hypothesis, risk of severe polio increased with socioeconomic status (SES) because higher SES was associated with older age at infection. Rural residence was also linked to increased polio risk due to older age at infection. Crowding and larger family size were associated with earlier age at infection and thus reduced the risk of severe polio. In contrast, according to the intensive-exposure hypothesis proposed by Nielsen and colleagues (2001, 2002), exposure to the poliovirus within the home was linked to increased severity of infection, making larger family size and crowding important risk factors. Data for polio deaths in Wentworth and York counties, including the cities of Hamilton and Toronto, from 1900 to 1937 were gathered from a variety of archival sources and socioeconomic class was coded using the five-point composite score scale from Hauser (1982). The results provide support for the intensive-exposure hypothesis as an addition to the traditional polio model. Age at death increased with status score during the earlier 1900–1929 period, but not in the 1930–1937 period. The overall proportions of polio deaths in the various status scores were stable over both periods and disproportionately prevalent in status score three (skilled blue collar). This analysis of polio mortality provides a more nuanced picture of the disease and its relation to SES in a time of rapidly changing socioecological conditions.

Type
Articles
Information
Social Science History , Volume 41 , Issue 2 , Summer 2017 , pp. 305 - 332
Copyright
Copyright © Social Science History Association, 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aaby, P. (1988) “Malnutrition and overcrowding/intensive exposure in severe measles infection: Review of community studies.” Reviews of Infectious Diseases 10 (2): 478–91.Google Scholar
Archives of Ontario, Series MS929, Reels 1–249. Accessed through Ancestry.ca (2010) Ontario, Canada, Births, 1869–1913 [database online]. Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations Inc. Google Scholar
Archives of Ontario, Series MS932, Reels1–833, 850–880. Accessed through Ancestry.ca (2010) Ontario, Canada, Marriages, 1801–1928 [database online]. Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations Inc.Google Scholar
Archives of Ontario, Series MS935, Reels 95–601. Accessed through Ancestry.ca (2010) Ontario, Canada, Deaths, 1869–1938 and Deaths Overseas, 1939–1947 [database online]. Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations Inc. Google Scholar
Baskerville, P., and Sager, E. W. (1998) Unwilling Idlers: The Urban Unemployed and Their Families in Late Victorian Canada. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.Google Scholar
Battles, H. T. (2008) “Patterns of diptheria in Hamilton, Ontario in the early twentieth century.” Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Canadian Association for Physical Anthropology, Hamilton, Ontario, November 7.Google Scholar
Battles, H. T. (2013) “Examining mortality patterns in the epidemic emergence of poliomyelitis in southern Ontario, Canada (1900–1937).” PhD diss., McMaster University.Google Scholar
Bernkopf, H., Medalie, J., and Yekutiel, M. (1957) “Antibodies to poliomyelitis virus and socioeconomic factors influencing their frequency in children in Israel.” American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene 6 (4): 697–703.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Berry, A. E., et al. (1939) Board Review on Sewage Treatment for City of Toronto. Toronto: City of Toronto.Google Scholar
Bordessa, R., and Cameron, J. M. (1980) “Sanitation, water and health: Two centuries of public health progress in Toronto,” in Barrett, F. A. (ed.), Canadian Studies in Medical Geography. Downview, ON: Department of Geography, York University: 121–46.Google Scholar
Boudreau, F. G., and Brain, C. K. (1914) Acute Poliomyelitis with Special Reference to the Disease in Ohio, and Certain Transmission Experiments. Columbus: F. J. Heer.Google Scholar
Bull, H. W. (1939) Poliomyelitis in the City of Melbourne 1937–8. Melbourne: Melbourne City Council.Google Scholar
Bunimovich-Mendrazitsky, S., and Stone, L. (2005) “Modeling polio as a disease of development.” Journal of Theoretical Biology 237 (3): 302–15.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Canada, Dominion Bureau of Statistics (1932) The Canada Year Book 1932. Ottawa, ON: F. A. Acland.Google Scholar
Canada, Dominion Bureau of Statistics (1924) Sixth Census of Canada, 1921 (Vol. 1). Ottawa, ON: F. A. Acland.Google Scholar
Canada, Dominion Bureau of Statistics (1925) Sixth Census of Canada, 1921 (Vol. 2). Ottawa, ON: F. A. Acland.Google Scholar
Cockburn, P. (2005) The Broken Boy. London: Vintage Books.Google Scholar
Collins, S. D. (1946) “The incidence of poliomyelitis and its crippling effects, as recorded in family surveys.” Public Health Reports 61 (10): 327–54.Google Scholar
Doucet, M., and Weaver, J. (1991) Housing the North American City. Montreal: McGill University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ewbank, D. C., and Preston, S. H. (1990) “Personal health behavior and the decline in infant and child mortality: The United States, 1900–1930,” in Caldwell, J. C., Findlay, S., Caldwell, P., Santow, G., Cosford, W., Braid, J., and Broes-Freeman, D. (eds.) What We Know About Health Transition: The Cultural, Social and Behavioural Determinants of Health. Canberra: Australian National University: 116–49.Google Scholar
Fales, T., and Taback, M. (1952) “Observations on the epidemiology of poliomyelitis.” Public Health Reports 67 (1): 47–52.Google Scholar
Fox, J. P., Hall, C. E., and Elveback, L. R. (1970) Epidemiology: Man and Diseases. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Gagan, R. (1981) “Disease, mortality, and public health, Hamilton, Ontario, 1900–1914.” Unpublished MA thesis, McMaster University.Google Scholar
Garđarsdóttir, Ó. (2002) Saving the Child: Regional, Cultural and Social Aspects of the Infant Mortality Decline in Iceland, 1770–1920. Umeå: The Demographic Data Base, Umeå University.Google Scholar
Gossage, P., and Gauvreau, D. (2007) “Canadian families in 1901: A bird's-eye view,” in Sager, E. W. and Baskerville, P. (eds.) Household Counts: Canadian Households and Families in 1901. Toronto: University of Toronto Press: 59–109.Google Scholar
Hall, J. B. (1911) “Acute poliomyeloencephalitis.” Journal of the National Medical Association 3 (2): 113–26.Google Scholar
Hardy, A. (1992) “Rickets and the rest: Child-care, diet and the infectious children's diseases, 1850–1914.” Social History of Medicine 5 (3): 389–412.Google Scholar
Harris, R. (1996) Unplanned Suburbs: Toronto's American Tragedy, 1900 to 1950. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Hauser, R. M. (1982) “Occupational status in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.” Historical Methods 15 (3): 111–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Herring, D. A., and Korol, E. (2012) “The north-south divide: Social inequality and mortality from the 1918 influenza pandemic in Hamilton, Ontario,” in Fahrni, M. and Jones, E. (eds.) Epidemic Encounters: Influenza, Society, and Culture in Canada, 1918–20. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press: 97–112.Google Scholar
Hiebert, D. (1995) “The social geography of Toronto in 1931: A study of residential differentiation and social structure.” Journal of Historical Geography 21 (1): 55–74.Google Scholar
Hooker, C., and Bashford, A. (2002) “Diphtheria and Australian public health: Bacteriology and its complex applications, c. 1890–1930.” Medical History 46 (1): 41–64.Google Scholar
Kunitz, S. J. (2007) The Health of Populations: General Theories and Particular Realities. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Library and Archives Canada (2004) Census of Canada, 1901. Series RG31-C-1, Statistics Canada Fonds, Microfilm reels: T-6428 to T-6556. Ottawa: Library and Archives Canada. Accessed through Ancestry.ca (2006) 1901 Census of Canada [database online]. Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations Inc.Google Scholar
Library and Archives Canada (2007) Census of Canada, 1911. Series RG31-C-1, Statistics Canada Fonds, Microfilm reels T-20326 to T-20460. Ottawa: Library and Archives Canada. Accessed through Ancestry.ca (2006) 1911 Census of Canada [database online]. Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations Inc.Google Scholar
Library and Archives Canada (2009) Census of Canada, 1891. Series RG31-C-1, Statistics Canada Fonds, Microfilm reels: T-6290 to T-6427. Ottawa: Library and Archives Canada. Accessed through Ancestry.ca (2008) 1891 Census of Canada [database online]. Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations Inc.Google Scholar
Library and Archives Canada (2013) Sixth Census of Canada, 1921. Series RG31. Ottawa: Library and Archives Canada. Accessed through Ancestry.ca (2013) 1921 Census of Canada [database online]. Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations Inc.Google Scholar
MacMurchy, H. (1912) “Paralysis: The new epidemic.” MacLean's Magazine, November, 109–16.Google Scholar
Mamelund, S. E. (2006) “A socially neutral disease? Individual social class, household wealth and mortality from Spanish influenza in two socially contrasting parishes in Kristiania 1918–19.” Social Science and Medicine 62 (4): 923–40.Google Scholar
Mechanic, D. (2002) “Disadvantage, inequality, and social policy.” Health Affairs 21 (2): 48–59.Google Scholar
Melnick, J. L., and Ledinko, N. (1951) “Social serology: Antibody levels in a normal young population during an epidemic of poliomyelitis.” American Journal of Hygiene 54 (3): 354–82.Google Scholar
Melnick, J. L., and Ledinko, N. (1953) “Development of neutralizing antibodies against the three types of poliomyelitis virus during an epidemic period.” American Journal of Hygiene 58 (2): 207–22.Google ScholarPubMed
Melnick, J. L., Paul, J. R., and Walton, M. (1955) “Serologic epidemiology of poliomyelitis.” American Journal of Public Health 45 (4): 429–37.Google Scholar
Mercier, M. E. (2006) “The social geography of childhood mortality, Toronto, 1901.” Urban Geography 27 (2): 126–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mercier, M., and Boone, C. G. (2002) “Infant mortality in Ottawa, Canada, 1901: Assessing cultural, economic and environmental factors.” Journal of Historical Geography 28 (4): 486–507.Google Scholar
Nielsen, N. M., Aaby, P., Wohlfahrt, J., Mølbak, K., and Melbye, M. (2002) “The polio model. Does it apply to polio?,” International Journal of Epidemiology 31 (1): 181–86.Google Scholar
Nielsen, N. M., Rostgaard, K., Juel, K., Askgaard, D., and Aaby, P. (2003) “Long-term mortality after poliomyelitis.” Epidemiology 14 (3): 355–60.Google Scholar
Nielsen, N. M., Aaby, P., Wohlfahrt, J., Pedersen, J. B., Melbye, M., and Mølbak, K. (2001) “Intensive exposure as a risk factor for severe polio: A study of multiple family cases.” Scandinavian Journal of Infectious Diseases 33 (4): 301–5.Google Scholar
Ontario Department of Health (1938) Report on Poliomyelitis in Ontario, 1937. Toronto: Department of Health, Province of Ontario.Google Scholar
Oshinsky, D. M. (2005) Polio: An American Story. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Piva, M. (1979) The Condition of the Working Class in Toronto, 1900–1921. Ottawa, ON: University of Ottawa Press.Google Scholar
Preston, S. H., and Haines, M. R. (1991) Fatal Years: Child Mortality in Late Nineteenth-Century America. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Rogers, N. (1989) “Dirt, flies and immigrants: Explaining the epidemiology of poliomyelitis, 1900–1916.” Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 44 (4): 486–505.Google Scholar
Rutty, C. J. (1996) “The middle-class plague: Epidemic polio and the Canadian state, 1936–37.” Canadian Bulletin of Medical History 13 (2): 277–314.Google ScholarPubMed
Sager, E. W. (2007) “Inequality, earnings, and the Canadian working class in 1901,” in Sager, E. W. and Baskerville, P. (eds.) Household Counts: Canadian Househols and Families in 1901. Toronto: University of Toronto Press: 339–70.Google Scholar
Scrimshaw, N. S., Taylor, C. E., and Gordon, J. E. (1959) “Interactions of nutrition and infection.” American Journal of the Medical Sciences 237 (3): 367–403.Google Scholar
Smallman-Raynor, M. R., Cliff, A. D., Trevelyan, B., Nettleton, C., and Sneddon, S. (2006) Poliomyelitis: A World Geography. Emergence to Eradication. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Synge, J. (1979) “The transition from school to work: Growing up working class in early 20th century Hamilton, Ontario,” in Ishwaran, K. (ed.) Childhood and Adolescence in Canada. Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson: 249–69.Google Scholar
Ulijaszek, S. J. (1990) “Nutritional status and susceptibility to infectious disease,” in Harrison, G. A. and Waterlow, J. C. (eds.) Diet and Disease in Traditional and Developing Societies. Vol. 30. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 137–54.Google Scholar
Velasquez-Manoff, M. (2012) An Epidemic of Absence: A New Way of Understanding Allergies and Autoimmune Diseases. New York: Scribner.Google Scholar
Walton, M., and Melnick, J. L. (1955) “Poliomyelitis antibodies in two differing socioeconomic groups within the same city.” Yale Journal of Biology and Medicine 27 (5): 359–70.Google Scholar
Weaver, J. C. (1982) Hamilton: An Illustrated History. Toronto: James Lorimer and Company.Google Scholar
Wood, H. A. (1987) “Emergence of the modern city: Hamilton, 1891–1950,” in Dear, M. J., Drake, J. J., and Reeds, L. G. (eds.) Steel City: Hamilton and Region. Toronto: University of Toronto Press: 119–37.Google Scholar
Zinkernagel, R. M. (2001) “Maternal antibodies, chilhood infections, and autoimmune diseases.” New England Journal of Medicine 345 (18): 1331–35.Google Scholar