Virus, Anti-Virus - To Be or Not To Be

The last post had a comment from my friend, Cliff, regarding vaccinations. I agree with him but it is the basis for this post and I wanted to save you the effort of having to go back if you didn't want to.

"I once attended a lecture by this guy who radidly spoke against vaccinations. He was a little extreme, but his claims had some valid points. In many other parts of the world people do not get all this vaccination stuff and they are not necessarily ill as a result. The one thing he pointed out that was very obvious to me is that there has not been a recorded case of polio in the last 50 years, so why do people still get vaccinated for it?

Vaccination is like it always has been, a situation of gamble and profit driven margins. Heck you live life thinking all these things could happen to ya, well ya might just pass up on the point, which is LIVING!"

My thoughs from this are Amen, Cliff! There is plenty of evidence of people getting the virus they were vaccinated to prevent. Polio was consdiered extinct. However, people have started to get it again. A few, even after the vaccine is administered, have always got it. So, like all things, there is no sure fire fix. In this country, if you don't get vaccinated for childhood diseases, your child can't go to school and eventually, may not be able to get a job in certain fields.

An interesting note, most third world countries are not known for the same kinds of diseases we get! They get things related to starvation. We get things related to excessive eating! There is a subtle irony here somewhere.

I'm not sure if poorer nations get things like whooping cough, which has also popped up again in America in recent years in some areas of the country. That is an awful disease. Measles are still floating around, too.

When I was studying anthropology, I read about tuberculosis, which America thought they had eradicated in the early 20th century. Aids has brought it back in force. My studies said that signs of this disease can be found in bones 10,000 years old. From the studies of ancient bones, they determined that this disease lies dormant for a very long time, dropping off the radar of humans. Then, it shows back up and becomes an epidemic, only to drop out of sight again. My guess . . . every virus has been here longer than we have. When nature decrees it is time for a purge, she calls in her army. They are very efficient, silent, and frequently deadly to thousands at a time.

I also suspect that ancient people were more efficient with the bodies of their dead. They didn't do autopsies and scientific experiments to see what they could find. They buried those who died by disease quickly or they burned the bodies. Fire is a great sanitizer.

Biblically, there were certain people who could handle a body. They were also separated from the tribe for a period of time after the had done so. This was a most efficient method to prevent disease in the camp from spreading and to insure if some did catch it, the numbers were limited and the persons would die outside the larger population. Sounds cold but most cultures had such methods in practice to insure their overall survival. They were much more practical about death.

Before modern medicine, people died of some terrible diseases. They had no way to prevent the spread of such diseases, no hospitals, no medicines. So, we've come a long way. But vaccines have proven that they are no cure for anything. They simply limit the spread and delay the onset of diseases that are probably simply waiting for orders from higher up.

Incidentally, my whole family, like most Americans have been vaccinated against all the childhood diseases. We haven't had them, well chickenpox and measles we've had. I appear to be immune to mumps. Been exposed several times. But vaccinations haven't saved me from other diseases. In the long run, one isn't much different from another to me. I've probably lived longer, but I probably won't care before it is over.