Our World Peace and Understanding Event on February 26 featured an incredibly inspirational talk by John Nanni. John is a Rotarian from Middletown-Odessa, Delaware and is one of 20 million polio survivors. John contracted polio at 10 months just before the Salk vaccine became available. He was paralyzed from the neck down for six months.Thanks to physical therapy to keep his muscles from atrophying, he was able to walk and appeared to have recovered completely. He played sports as a child. At around 40 he began suffering effects of post-polio syndrome: muscle weakness, joint pain and extreme fatigue. In post-polio syndrome, survivors have used other muscles to compensate for damaged muscles and it caused those muscles to weaken.
John talked about the role Rotary's PolioPlus campaign has in bringing peace and understanding to the world. In areas like Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Gaza, Rotary and our world partners are on the forefront of not only eliminating polio but are seen by the world as representatives of doing good, which only can help world peace.
John is a gregarious personality and most of the crowd asked to take photos with him after his presentation. John also helped open the program by singing God Bless America.
Pictured above with John are Tim Kelley, Terry Rezendes Curran, Tom Hankard and Pooja Singla, the District Governor track.
Below pictured are Danvers Rotarians Philip Wilson and Club President Rich Vincent. Philip, a long time Rotarian and recently moved to Massachusetts, is a polio survivor and is also available to speak to clubs on PolioPlus.