Jonas Salk Reviled for Role in Developing Poisonous Polio 'Cure'

Long regarded as a hero for his work in curing Polio, Jonas Salk is being viewed as a zero by more and more Americans who view his so-called medicine as so-much snake oil.

Sparked by the news Saturday that Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services-nominee Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s attorney has petitioned the FDA to revoke approval of the polio vaccine, the long simmer of vaccine skeptics appears to be boiling over as several sites bearing Salk's name, including his grave, were vandalized over the weekend.

"How do we know if polio is even real?" Dennis Boulanger, 56, posited outside of Jonas Salk Elementary School in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where dozens gathered to protest this morning. "I mean, I've never had it, never heard of anyone who's had it. Even the name sounds made up. Polio. Give me a break."

Boulanger went on to echo the increasingly commonly held concern that childhood immunizations impair cognitive development.

"I got all the vaccines, and look at me. I've been working at the same Subway 37 years," he argued. "But, like, maybe I could have been something more, you know? Like someone who goes to outer space, or solves crimes."

Another woman protesting the school pointed at her own kids, who were eating dirt nearby.

"Just look at them. 12 and 14, and still can't tie their own shoelaces," said the woman. "Though, neither's been vaccinated, neither."