2024-03-13 18:39:37
He lived in an iron lung for more than 70 years – now US citizen Paul Alexander is dead. His brother died at the age of 78, Philip Alexander announced on Facebook on Wednesday. “It is with a heavy heart that I announce that my brother died last night.” According to an entry on Paul Alexander’s Tiktok channel, he was taken to the intensive care unit following becoming infected with the coronavirus.
Paul Alexander from Dallas, Texas, was diagnosed with polio at the age of six. Since then he has been paralyzed from the neck down and has to rely on the so-called iron lung – a mechanical breathing device. With the exception of the head, the patient lies completely in a hollow cylinder closed off at the neck; air is forced into and out of the lungs with the help of different pressures.
Paul Alexander spent more than 70 years in this type of submarine cylinder. Despite this, he managed to study, got a law degree and worked in this field. He also wrote a book.
According to the Guinness Book of Records, the deceased was the person who lived the longest in an iron lung. He was therefore able to temporarily leave the device following learning a special breathing technique. Eventually he returned to his iron lung only to sleep.
With the invention of the vaccination once morest polio in the 1950s, the disease was reduced and the iron lung was made obsolete by the invention of other ventilators. According to reports, there is only one person left in such a device in the world: 75-year-old Martha Lillard in the US state of Oklahoma.
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