Paralysis Outbreak Among N.Z. Troops in 1945

Chronicle (Levin), 21 January 1948, Page 4

Paralysis Outbreak Among N.Z. Troops in 1945

Although very few soldiers knew it at the time, an outbreak of infantile paralysis among troops of the 2iid N.Z.E.F. in Italy in 1945, •after the war was over, caused senior officers ' considerable concern, and was refiected in a number of severe restfictions on the activities of troops. In the extremely hot summer of 1945 in Italy, after the New Zealand Division had been at -Trieste, almost all units of the division were stationed at Lake Trasimeno, in Central Italy. The troops found the lake area an ideal rest centre, with ample swimming and good fishing" (even although hand grehades sometimes replaced rod and line) . Almost overnight, strict regulatidns were enforced, including a ban on swimming in the lake. Some big units were shifted from the area altogether, to hastily-prepared camp sites on the Adriatic coast. The reason for the regulations was not given in routine orders. It was the notiflcation itom several units of cases, some severe, of infantile paralysis. Careful examination by medical units resulted in the lake waters being blamed as ithe.source of infection. For innumerable years the sewerage from villages around the lake had been dumped into it, and the Army, concemed at the prospect of the disease's spreading, introdueed its unpopular regulations. The outbreak at no stage reached epidemic proportions, - and the authorities were satisfied that their regulations against swimming were the cause of its being checked.