Home›Open Questions›Which polio vaccine strategy, Salk's injected inactivated vaccine or Sabin's live oral vaccine, better serves eradication?Open QuestionsWhich polio vaccine strategy, Salk's injected inactivated vaccine or Sabin's live oral vaccine, better serves eradication?Citation FormatsGeneral ReferenceGeneral Reference Citation TextMedicine Atlas. "Which polio vaccine strategy, Salk's injected inactivated vaccine or Sabin's live oral vaccine, better serves eradication?." Accessed August 30, 2026. https://medicine.interactiveatlas.org/open-questions-index/salk-versus-sabin-vaccine-strategy.Copy General ReferenceAPA StyleAPA Style Citation TextMedicine Atlas. (n.d.). Which polio vaccine strategy, Salk's injected inactivated vaccine or Sabin's live oral vaccine, better serves eradication?. Retrieved August 30, 2026, from https://medicine.interactiveatlas.org/open-questions-index/salk-versus-sabin-vaccine-strategyCopy APA StyleBibTeXBibTeX Citation Text@misc{medicineatlas-which-polio-vaccine-strategy-salk-s-inje, author = {Medicine Atlas}, title = {Which polio vaccine strategy, Salk's injected inactivated vaccine or Sabin's live oral vaccine, better serves eradication?}, year = {2026}, url = {https://medicine.interactiveatlas.org/open-questions-index/salk-versus-sabin-vaccine-strategy}, note = {Accessed August 30, 2026} }Copy BibTeXOpen QuestionCross-Tradition ConnectionsSourcesComments (0)Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)Open QuestionThe oral vaccine is cheaper, easier to administer and induces stronger intestinal immunity that blocks transmission, which made it the workhorse of the global eradication campaign; but its live virus can, rarely, revert to a form that causes circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus (cVDPV) outbreaks, 721 cases of which were reported worldwide between January 2005 and May 2016, 94 percent of them from the vaccine's own type 2 component. The injected inactivated vaccine carries no such reversion risk but is costlier, requires trained staff to administer, and confers weaker intestinal immunity. The World Health Organization coordinated a global, synchronized switch from trivalent to bivalent oral vaccine in April 2016 specifically to retire the type 2 oral component, introducing injected vaccine into routine schedules worldwide to cover the resulting gap, a policy tradeoff public health authorities continue to weigh as wild poliovirus nears eradication in the remaining endemic countries.What would resolve this Sustained, verified interruption of all wild and vaccine-derived poliovirus transmission worldwide following a specific vaccine strategy, or a WHO Strategic Advisory Group of Experts consensus settling the remaining oral-to-inactivated transition timeline.OpenPublic Health and EpidemiologyCDC MMWR: Introduction of Inactivated Poliovirus Vaccine and Switch from Trivalent to Bivalent Oral Poliovirus VaccineCross-Tradition ConnectionsQuestion OnDevelopment of the Polio Vaccine, Discoveries Well-attested Source CDC MMWR: Introduction of Inactivated Poliovirus Vaccine and Switch from Trivalent to Bivalent Oral Poliovirus VaccineSourcesCDC MMWR: Introduction of Inactivated Poliovirus Vaccine and Switch from Trivalent to Bivalent Oral Poliovirus VaccineCenters for Disease Control and Prevention, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly ReportThe Debate and Mitigation StrategyView the SourceComments (0)No comments yet. Be the first to share a thought.Sign in to join the discussion.Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.Sign in to dispute this or suggest a correction.View At A Past YearThe atlas records no dated fact of its own for this entry, so there is no other year to choose.Show This Year