The fight against polio through the NO-DO newsreels during the Francoism period in Spain

Abstract

The weekly NO-DO newsreels, official and of obligatory projection in cinemas, held an information monopoly during the Francoist dictatorship (1943-1975) in Spain. The NO-DO was used as an instrument of indoctrination and legitimation, building a discourse based on the regime’s needs and interests. In this study, we examined newsreels on medical subjects related to vaccine-preventable diseases. A majority of reports centred on poliomyelitis, and two differentiated periods could be defined, coinciding with the evolution of the Franco regime’s foreign policy. The first period reflected the regime’s era of isolation and referred to polio as a foreign disease, with the NO-DO showing the US initiatives to fight against it, as it had become the scientific model to follow. Subsequently, the ambiguities of the news related to the disease reflected the dictatorship’s refusal to confront the epidemic suffered by the Spanish population until the vaccination campaigns began in 1963. Even then, the consequences that the negligent management of the disease had for many families were concealed. Meanwhile, the image of a modernized country concerned about national public health was legitimized.