Enter the life of Paul Alexander, the "Polio"

American lawyer, author and disability activist Paul Alexander, also known as Polio Paul, died today at the age of 78.

Alexander is famous for his unique 72 years of life, which he spent in a medical device known as an “iron lung,” a metal tube used to help pump air in and out of the lungs Department to treat polio survivors. In fact, he spent more time in the device than anyone is known to have ever lived.

Polio is a largely eradicated infectious disease that causes long-term, lifelong muscle weakness in some patients. In the worst cases, it can lead to paralysis. Iron lung pressure can help people with this type of breathing difficulty survive in the long term.

However, despite being dependent on the device for most of his adult life and sometimes having to communicate by holding a pen in his mouth and tapping on a keyboard, he still lived an impressive life with many accomplishments before his death . COVID-19. These include a legal career and 35,000 TikTok followers.

Who is Paul Alexander?

When Paul was six years old, he contracted polio, a disease common at the time. Although he survived, he was paralyzed mostly from the waist down and spent his days trapped in a metal tube. He was unable to speak for 18 months due to invasive surgery on his throat.

Paul was certainly not the only one whose life was changed by polio that summer. He contracted the disease during the worst polio outbreak in U.S. history, with nearly 58,000 cases reported, most of them child.

Alexander eventually became the first person to graduate from Dallas, Texas, high school without having to attend classes in person.

Not only did he graduate from high school, he eventually graduated from Southern Methodist University in Dallas and then from the University of Texas at Austin School of Law.

With the help of a therapist, Alexander eventually managed to reduce his dependence on the iron lung, allowing him to step away from the tube, even if only for a few hours.

This meant he was finally able to leave his metal shell and represent clients in court.

But according to his biography, there was more to his life than just work Three minutes of dog ownership: My life in an iron lunghe successfully traveled and got married.

Not only did he exceed his doctors’ expectations, but he ended up outliving his parents and older brother, Nick Alexander.

What is a long iron and how does it work?

Iron lungs have long been obsolete in the medical world, and a new technology called a pressure ventilation system is now more common. They are much less invasive than iron lungs, easier to transport, and do not cover the victim’s entire body.

Polio has also been largely eradicated in the West, thanks to massive global vaccination campaigns that began in the 1960s and continued for decades.

However, outbreaks in Afghanistan and Pakistan remain unknown, and outbreaks continue to occur occasionally in sub-Saharan Africa.

The Taliban once resisted global pressure from groups such as UNICEF to vaccinate Afghanistan’s entire population, while some in conservative Muslim groups promoted the idea: This is a Western conspiracy to sterilize Muslims.