Polio survivor shares his story with Rotarians
(Image provided) Little Jim Jeselnick made an amazing recovery from polio as a child and is shown below leaving the hospital with his parents. Jeselnick talked with Columbia City Rotary members Tuesday about the importance of vaccinating against polio in the remaining countries where polio continues to infect people.
By Jennifer Zartman Romano
Looking at the black and white images of an adorable little boy smiling at the camera in the hallways of Zem Zem Hospital the 1950s, you’d be surprised to know just how sick Jim Jeselnick had been. 
Now a former Rotary District Governor, Jeselnick visited the Columbia City Rotary Tuesday to share the ways in which his life has come full circle with regards to polio.
“For me, when I heard polio was a major project of Rotary – that’s why I joined in 1990-91,” Jeselnick said. “I’ve come full circle.”
“What I found in reading is that it started in 1914 in New York,” Jeselnick said.
By the early 1950s, the dark-haired boy with a grin was among the 120,000 cases of polio in the United States. Many were paralyzed, many died. Jeselnick, however, persevered and has no outward effects of the disease today.
“Because of prayers and hard work, I survived.” He still has one of his hospital bills from Bradford General Hospital for $692.56 – a small fortunate at the time – to treat his illness, an illness that resulted in the 30-day quarantine of his entire family.
His experience with polio truly came full circle when he traveled with a group of Rotarians to Niger to assist with a four-day polio vaccine campaign. “I needed to have the satisfaction of knowing I was saving a child from getting polio.
During his visit to Niger, a place he describes as “not like here,” Jeselnick worked alongside fellow Rotarians from the United States from 6:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. each day providing polio vaccine to children. He estimates that volunteers were able to inoculate 300 people in that time period. One of the children he met while there was the granddaughter of the president of the country.
“We didn’t miss very many,” he said. Not only did they provide the vaccine in towns, they also traveled in to rugged bush areas where miles divided houses and gave the vaccine wherever they could find people. But, despite their efforts and the efforts of others, polio continues to maim and kill.
According to Jeselnick, there are only a few remaining corners of the world where polio has not yet been eliminated – including Niger, Afghanistan, Pakistan and parts of India.
“Two of these places are among the most dangerous in the world,” Jeselnick said. “They need to stop fighting long enough for us to administer the vaccinations and access the remote areas.”
The difficulty in eradicating the disease in India, Jeselnick said, is the rapidly growing population. “It’s the number of babies born every month. In that case, it’s numbers,” he said. “But we are winning the battle.”
Jeselnick said all of the people vaccinated were very receptive and cooperative. Still, it is those areas of the world where they’ve not yet reached and the fact that polio continues to exist that keeps Jeselnick and others working to save children from the disease.
“That’s why your donation to the Foundation is so important,” Jeselnick said. “I’d ask every single one of you to make a donation by the end of this year. Put in what you feel you can afford.”
To make a donation to the Columbia City Rotary to help stop polio in other parts of the world, contact Don Sexton via e-mail at dsexton@columbiacity.net