Lee Harman Drives Miss Vicky from Alaska to Mexico
in a Determined Quest to Eradicate Polio
UPDATE: Lee Harman and Miss Vicky are on the road! Click here for blog updates from the road.
Lee Harman, a member of the Rotary Club of Arlington since 1985, is planning his second marathon endurance race in his 1931 Vintage Ford Victoria automobile to raise funds and awareness for the Rotary PolioPlus Campaign. You can support his adventure with a donation online that goes 100% to PolioPlus: CLICK TO DONATE.
The first adventure in 2019 was a 10,000-mile trek from Peking to Paris in 36 days. The 2023 Marathon is a 7,600-mile endurance race from Anchorage to Cabo San Lucas, with overnight stops in Dawson Creek, Walla Walla, Moab, and Tucson. The goal is to raise $76,000 for PolioPlus, asking individuals to consider a $76 donation and clubs to consider a $7600 donation.
Lee believes anything can be accomplished, including eradicating Polio, if a vintage car can complete a course where 40% of the route will be off-road. Participating cars include those built before 1974 and some vintage machines like Miss Vicky.
Lee Harman’s own involvement in PolioPlus has taken him to India to work with teams from CDC, the World Health Organization, and UNICEF, entering off-the-grid villages to inoculate children. He saw firsthand how lives can improve. Rotarians, like Harman, know the pain and suffering that polio has wrought, mainly targeting humankind’s most vulnerable.
The “plus” is other things provided in the polio eradication campaign. It might be a hand-operated tricycle or access to water. It might be additional medical treatment, bed nets, or soap. A 2010 study estimates that vitamin A drops given to children at the same time as the polio vaccine have prevented 1.25 million deaths by decreasing susceptibility to infectious diseases.
Miss Vicky has received 54 modifications, the most recent being upgrading the suspension system with truck springs and shocks adding heat and air conditioning. She also has a 72-horsepower endurance engine, steel bearings, a modern downdraft carburetor, an upgraded air filter, a modern clutch, and an updated wiring harness.
“Miss Vicky is designed not so much to be first in the race but to endure to the finish line,” Lee explains. Support vehicles equipped with mechanic supplies and tools accompany the race. But Lee and his co-drivers carry some parts unique to a 1931 Ford.
Polio is still with us, though oral and injected vaccines have eliminated 99% of wild polio virus cases. Rotary has been a founding partner of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative since its first project to vaccinate children in the Philippines in 1979. More than 430 million children have been vaccinated to date.
Here is Lee's schedule:
It costs $3 to protect a child against polio fully. Dollars donated to the Rotary PolioPlus Campaign are matched 2:1 by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Up to 95% of polio cases show no symptoms. Many people may have fever, sore throat, headache, nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, or diarrhea. 1 in 200 infections have led to irreversible paralysis (usually of the legs). Among those paralyzed, 5 to 10% of patients die when breathing muscles become immobilized. Polio (poliomyelitis) mainly affects children under 5 years of age. Polio cases have decreased by over 99% since 1988, from an estimated 350 000 cases then, to 37 reported cases in 2016 and just 2 cases in Afghanistan and 20 cases in Pakistan in 2022. However, a visitor to the Middle East returned to New York having contracted Polio.
Editor's Note: Here are a couple of links: To donate: https://raise.rotary.org/MissVicky/Challenge
More About the Marathon: https://rallytheglobe.com/alaska-to-mexico/