Wednesday, August 31, 2016

My Smallpox Vaccination Scar

Occasionally I’ll run across a nut who thinks the purpose of vaccinations is to reduce the population (and when I say nuts, I do mean nuts). You know – wipe out 90% of the people (which would return us to the about 1000 AD, including the wealthy who are supposedly behind this plot).

I have a smallpox vaccination scar on my left bicep. I remember getting it. The reason it’s a scar is because I was scratched with a needle, and it left a small round scar when it healed. I remember the scab turned green.

I think I was about nine or ten but I’m not sure.

No one has those scars anymore because there is no more smallpox. A lot of people used to die from smallpox and if they didn’t die it left horrible huge pockmarks on their face. Google them and you can see the pictures.

Entire villages of American Indians were wiped out by smallpox because the Indians had no natural immunity at all to European diseases. The Indians would flee the infected villages, not even stopping to bury the dead.

Some years ago I was at the cemetery where my grandparents are buried. I encountered a children’s section in one corner where almost all of them had died of polio during the ‘50s. There were marbles stuck in the concrete grave markers and black-and-white pictures of the children.

I also remember drinking some sort of concoction to prevent polio. I also know an older woman who had polio as a child (she must be in her 70s by now). She said she spend seven years lying on her back and ended up in her 50’s in a wheelchair. Post-polio syndrome, she told me.

They used to put children in iron lungs (no one less than my age knows what they are) because they could barely breathe on their own. That’s what polio did to them.

One of my old girlfriends told me her aunt died at two years old of tetanus. Her father told her it was a horrible death (sometimes the spasms break bones). Of course there was no tetanus vaccine back then (had I been a doctor back then I would have told the parents I could end her suffering with a shot, which I suspect happened at times).

Smallpox, polio, tetanus, diphtheria, whooping cough, rabies – all gone.

I got what was called the DPT vaccine – diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus. Nasty diseases and all of them can kill you. The last one will kill you.

I remember reading in one of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s book how the whole family came down with diphtheria at the same time and all of them almost died. They couldn’t even get out of bed.

I did get measles (all three kinds, and according to my mother I was about six months old when I first got the measles), mumps and chicken pox (parents used to take their children and have them sleep overnight in the same bed with kids who had those diseases. That’s how I got the mumps. I also got mononucleosis but that was from a girl – that’s why it was called “the kissing disease.” And that one made me anemic and exhaused for a month.)

During World War I more people died world-wide from the flu than were killed in the war. Some people would be okay one day and dead the next. My grandfather missed that one but did get malaria in Panama while in the Army.

The only problem with vaccinations is that they aren’t perfect. There will always be a vanishingly small minority who are damaged or die from a reaction. But that is balanced by those who aren’t damaged or die and in fact are saved from those things. Or would you prefer we still have smallpox and polio?

This doesn’t mean I think every vaccination is necessary. The idea of vaccinating a baby as soon as it pops out of the womb is ridiculous. It was done to my niece’s baby and he turned yellow for two weeks.

Still, I don’t understand what I call Conspironuts. Vaccinations have been around for hundreds of years – and in one form or another, a thousand) and suddenly they’re part of a conspiracy? I mean, what the hell? How can anyone be that demented to believe that?

Unfortunately the “mind” of a Conspironut cannot be changed, just the way the mind of someone who believes in chemtrails cannot be changed.

There are always (and always has been) people out there who truly believe there is some vast, world-wide conspiracy (some going back several hundred years), whose only purpose is to Do Evil. And to conquer the world, like Pinky and the Brain.

I don’t understand these people at all. But then, I’m not a Conspironut.

10 comments:

Shaun F said...

I deal with a lot of babies. And when I ask the parents about vaccinations there just seems to be a significantly larger amount of rounds of vaccination at a young age - like prior to five years. Every few months a bunch of shots. I asked my folks and it wasn't like that in the 60s.

Robert What? said...

The number of vaccines that babies get has sky rocketed in the last couple of decades. It's not a population conspiracy. It's big, profitable business.

Anonymous said...

You're over simplifying this a bit. The first issue is that, like everything in life, vaccines are a cost/benefit trade. The problem is that we don't really know what the cost is, nor what the real benefit is for a lot of these newer vaccines as any real studies on them are not really disclosed to you (Gardasil is a good example of that, some real horror stories out there and the effectiveness is questionable at best but the propaganda for this is immense and I'm sure the company that makes it is cleaning up). The other issue is both the shear number of vaccines given and the early age that they are given, had a doctor tell me up front that the US vaccine schedule was insane, that a child's immune system simply could not handle that may shocks to their immune system and that we should have something closer to Europe where most vaccines are delayed until the child is around 5 year old or so.

Glen Filthie said...

You are absolutely correct Bob. Immunology is an established science with repeatable consistent results that are beyond dispute. The problem is that science - REAL science - is inconvenient to scammers trying to make a buck. It scares the shit out of stupid people. So it is that you get the warble gloamers and the anti-vaxxers.

I have no problem with stupid people killing their kids either through abortion or by refusing to vaccinate their young. They shouldn't be breeding anyways. The fact is the third world is importing all kinds of new diseases and we could sure use a good pandemic to thin 'em out a bit.

Unknown said...

"You're over simplifying this a bit."

After what I've seen and wrote you actually believe that?

Ever met anyone who's survived polio? I have - two people.

I know all about way too many vaccines today.

Anonymous said...

The anti-vaxers ask some legitimate questions.

I did have a pharmacist friend that has gotten sick from the flu shot, but that does not mean everyone got sick.

I would like to know more about any real research on their administration, at what ages, and whether it is a bunch of stuff at one time or a slower paced schedule.

General P. Malaise said...

I'm surprised you didn't use the word consensus.

Most people know nothing about the vaccine industry or how vaccines are made or what the fine print on the vaccine description says yet have no problem telling everyone how good and safe they are.

be a little critical and do a bit of research (research that isn't the pharma company literature).

it will give you pause ...well it would if you did it. I doubt you will.

Unknown said...

"Most people know nothing about the vaccine industry or how vaccines are made or what the fine print on the vaccine description says yet have no problem telling everyone how good and safe they are."

I know how vaccines are made, I know about the side effects, I know all about them - and anyone who would not have them and rather take the chance with tetanus or diphtheria or polio or smallpox is out of their minds.

Thane Eichenauer said...

Uncle Bob what do you think of experiences like this?

http://hawaiianlibertarian.blogspot.com/2016/08/i-got-vaxxed.html

"No thank you, I don't want any shots."

"But you said you think it was a nail that cut you open...do you have any idea what tetanus lockjaw does to you? I've seen it, and it is terrible. There is no cure! I'm NOT letting you leave here without a tetanus shot."

Unknown said...


If the wound bleeds freely no shot is required. A tetanus shot is necessary when there is a puncture would that does not bleed - like stepping on a nail. I've seen that happen.