Paul got worse fast. His parents rushed him to the hospital for fever and muscle aches. It was crowded; lots of sick kids were waiting, as there’s no cure.
At first, Paul was thought dead, but another doc saved him with an emergency tracheotomy. Right after, he was put in an iron lung.
Invented in the 1920s, the iron lung (originally the “Drinker respirator”) wraps most of the body and uses air pressure changes to help you breathe.
“I had no clue what was up. I had wild thoughts about dying. Was this death? A coffin? A bad place?” Paul told As It Happens host Carol Off in 2017. “I tried to move, not even a finger. It was super strange.”