A switch from a live polio vaccine to an inactive one appears to have eliminated all U.S. cases of the disease caused by the vaccine itself, the federal government reports.
In 2000, U.S. health officials recommended that doctors only use vaccines with an inactive polio virus. They reached that conclusion after receiving evidence that the oral vaccine containing live polio virus might have caused cases of the disease in rare instances, according to the Associated Press.
Based on data from 1990 to 2003, the last case of vaccine-related polio occurred in 1999, researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported in the Oct. 13 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Researcher Lorraine Nino Alexander and her fellow CDC researchers called the finding a “major public health accomplishment in the United States,” the AP said.