To Vaccinate or Not to Vaccinate THAT is the Question: PBS’s Frontline showed a segment on childhood vaccinations. As many know whether to vaccinate a child for the various so called childhood diseases is a controversial subject today. One woman interviewed in the Frontline documentary said that we had not had a case of wild polio in this country for decades and that wild polio is all but eliminated from the planet so she saw no need to vaccinate for that here. I differ with her STRONGLY. Polio is NOT eliminated from the planet. She is making, in my opinion, a HUGE error because we are a globalized society. There IS wild polio still remaining in some third world countries. In addition, there are global areas which are at war, areas of turmoil and areas which present different religious obstacles preventing (hard to believe as it may be), immunizations. All it takes is one unvaccinated person entering this country harboring the virus and settling in an area where there are numbers of children and even adults who are not vaccinated against this dreaded disease for that child to create an epidemic which will spread to the unvaccinated. This is unacceptable, it is immoral and, in my opinion, it is wrong.

I speak unfortunately not as a scientist or physician but from personal experience. I contracted polio in 1954 at five years old, six months before a vaccine was available. If the vaccination had been available then and I had not been vaccinated, I would have later thought it criminal not to have been vaccinated against it.

There are, of course, other aspects of this complex problem. Perhaps SOME of the diseases within vaccinations could be eliminated or injections spread out more evenly or the other substances within the vaccine itself could be examined BUT, in my opinion, it is UNCONSCIONABLE with respect to polio in particular for anyone to say that because wild polio has not been seen in this country that this disease is eradicated. Polio is NEVER ERADICATED UNLESS children are immunized with the polio vaccines to prevent it. It CAN return at any time and WILL if children are not immunized against it.

I can testify to the fact that polio is a life long horrendous, deformative and expensive disease. I was considered "lucky" at that time as it completely paralyzed only my right leg. My left leg was functional but is still somewhat compromised. Polio for me meant constant hospital returns, three painful surgeries to ameliorate its after effects and it meant paying for expensive equipment to this day.

After mid life when bones become weaker it meant THREE successive FEMUR fractures of my polio leg. That leg is extraordinarily fragile. It has meant additional hospitalizations as an adult taking one year per each fracture to heal because that leg does not heal quickly. The risk to that bone is significant as now, falling is a regular occurrence. Aging makes life even more difficult for a post polio survivor. Fracturing that bone a fourth time could be life altering or even life threatening!

Polio is a life long, utterly deforming, and an EXPENSIVE disease. It has caused UNTOLD hardship, psychological damage and as an adult it has cost me my stamina that others of my age still possess. Polio has had HUGE complications in my life and it is, in my opinion, UNFORGIVABLE for a child not to be immunized, at the very least, for that. Life is a risk. The risk of acquiring polio is much too great and the benefits of vaccination to prevent polio are much too good, not to vaccinate. To vaccinate or not to vaccinate that is the question. The answer for me is abundantly clear. For THAT disease, it is an absolute and unequivocal YES!

The Sickest Slick: I am in another hurry this a.m. so this is off the top of my just awakened brain. I am SICK SICK at heart about the drilling oil spill off our coast as I have iterated before. I feel like I want to cry. If I were a believing person with SO much disaster I have never seen SO much disaster in the world from economic to climate, earthquakes, floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, climate change, tsunami's, mine disasters and so much more I can't keep track of all of it and now THIS disaster I might think Revelation is at hand. Don't worry I'm not a believing person in THAT anyway but it is HORRIFIC. I just KNOW they won't contain this spill for weeks if not months and I just know it is oozing more probably much more as the Coast Guard says today AND worse they have to burn it sending HUGE toxic plumes of ugly disgusting poisonous smoke into our air. A reporter said the wonderful smell of salt water is obliterated there and replaced by the cancerous smell of oil. I won't even mention the eleven humans dead and many injured from this rig explosion.

Do I want to say Palin with her drill baby drill is the idiot of idiots? YES but why why does this brilliant president in whom I had SO much faith WHY would he EVER on planet earth EVER decide to lift the coastal drilling ban when EVERY good mind who KNOWS about drilling oil knows it's risky, dangerous and whatever we get WON'T be enough. It just delays what we REALLY need to concentrate on and that is clean energy. WHY DID HE DO THIS? I simply do NOT get him. I love him but he is still the enigma to me he was when he began his run. Something is undecipherable about this president and I just don't know what it is. BUT who would care about that if his policy decisions were what I thought in the beginning they would be and if they did not impact us so hugely! This oil spill I will say it again is just an AWFUL AWFUL thing. Drill baby drill around our coast should be HALTED IMMEDIATELY and Sarah Palin should put a sock in her moronic mouth!

Barack Obama WHAT are you doing, who are you? Where is the progressive senator I knew and loved? I'm am sick at heart, saddened and disappointed beyond belief. Our beautiful coast and all the animals, birds etc. are at grave risk. The poor innocent beautiful things. Please anyone out there if you are working on this and can save those gorgeous animals do and save us while you are at it. IF this slick hits the shores of LA, FLA, and Mississippi or WORSE they won't know what hit them and neither will we!