What is Poliomyelitis?
[[File:Polio lores134.jpg|thumb|A man's right leg, affected by polio]] {{external media |topic = on [[Sputnik V]] Official YouTube Channel |video1 = {{YouTube|tFg-AR8emVo|Polio outbreak in Japan. - Lessons of playing vaccine politics.|}}<ref>History is teaching us an important lesson that playing politics with vaccination campaign in the midst of a deadly pandemic is immoral and costs lives. A Step, a 1988 Soviet-Japanese movie directed by Alexander Mitta, is about a struggle to bring a safe and effective Soviet vaccine against polio to Japan in the end of 1950s to help the country fight a deadly outbreak of the disease. The story is very much reminiscent of our effort to bring Sputnik V vaccine to different countries to fight the COVID-19 pandemic in 2021.Pharmaceutical giants with the help from some bureaucrats and biased media put up a resistance to Soviet vaccine imports, maintaining an artificial deficit of polio vaccines in the country in order to protect their monopoly and revenues at the expense of suffering children. Thanks to determination of ordinary Japanese mothers who took to the streets, demanding permission to import the Soviet vaccine and wisdom of honest politicians who cared for their people, the Soviet vaccine finally made its way to Japan. Mass vaccination with the Soviet vaccine started in 1961 and the polio epidemic stopped soon after. We call on politicians, media and regulators not to repeat mistakes from 60 years ago. Examples of Argentina, Hungary, Serbia, San Marino and many other countries where Sputnik V is administered show that using a portfolio of safe and effective vaccines regardless of their origin is the quickest way to defeating the pandemic and saving people’s lives. Thank to cooperation with Russia’s legendary Mosfilm studio the Russian Direct Investment Fund and the Sputnik V team would like to share highlights of this film with its international audience to remind of this great moment in history.</ref> }} '''Poliomyelitis''', or '''polio''', is a [[virus (biolog