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The decade of summer fears: Polio epidemics in 1950's Hungary
| Poliomyelitis swept over Hungary in several outbreaks, between 1952 and 1959, attacking the young population, threatening to undermine efforts to recover the war-stricken society. Polio's effect on Hungarian society was considered so significant, that revolutionary prime-minister Imre Nagy took steps to deal with the disease amidst the turbulent events of the 1956 uprising. The polio outbreaks in 1950's Hungary can be seen as exceptional events through which to understand the forming Communist society. I concentrate on two questions: 1) how post-war Communist governments and the existing, as well as newly established, medical institutions reacted to the disease, and 2) how the disease affected conceptions of the socialist productive and reproductive body. Namely, I am interested in how a pro-natalist population policy confronted large-scale childhood disease, what that meant for the new responsibilities of motherhood, and finally, through what medical, technological and institutional innovations it managed to control the disease. My sources are medical texts, government and hospital documents, and accounts by survivors. The paper offers comparison with the issues of polio in U.S. history.
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