The Peak

After a headlong start early in the year, infantile paralysis was slowing down. By last week, U.S. Public Health Service chartmakers could point with confidence to the week ended Aug. 20 (in which 3,419 cases were reported) as the year's peak. Since then, the curve has been downward. But 1949 was certain to have a staggering polio toll marked against it: already 29,051 cases had been reported, and by year's end the total would be nearer 40,000.

Statisticians poring over the reports found some cold comfort. This year's total, whatever it might be, could not be compared directly with the 1916 total of 30,000 cases, because the U.S. population has increased by about half in the meantime. Also, because so many milder cases are now properly diagnosed and reported, the proportion of crippling and fatal cases is far less. (The death rate among youngsters under 15 is now one-fifteenth the rate of the 1916 mortality.)

Most schools opened on schedule, and health authorities argued that children were safer in school than out because carefully regulated schedules would protect them from overexertion. Besides, it is easier to get them to bed earlier with the warning of "school tomorrow." But in the lower grades there were many empty seats. Said a Brooklyn principal: "Parents are dreadfully scared."

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