Friday, October 14, 2005
Polio Tragedy
The one thing we can clearly point with pride to in modern medicine is the elegant solution to communicable diseases called inoculation. Introduce a weakened form of the virus into the blood and the body learns to fight off a more powerful version later. Teach the body to fight the disease and there's nothing else the doctor has to do. Brilliant.
Some diseases, once everyone is inoculated and the wild forms eradicated, are gone forever, like Small Pox (unless we use it as a weapon). Other diseases are alive in the wilds and will never be eradicated, like polio. I was one of the first generation to become immunized to polio (I can still recall sucking something down on a sugar cube). Every generation needs to do the same and when they don't, through a willful living anachronistically, tragedy like this can ensue.
Some diseases, once everyone is inoculated and the wild forms eradicated, are gone forever, like Small Pox (unless we use it as a weapon). Other diseases are alive in the wilds and will never be eradicated, like polio. I was one of the first generation to become immunized to polio (I can still recall sucking something down on a sugar cube). Every generation needs to do the same and when they don't, through a willful living anachronistically, tragedy like this can ensue.
# posted by Roger Fraley @ 6:14 AM 
