Pen-demic

This evening’s newscast had another story about the latest developments in the battle against Covid and the citizens of the United States have become divided between the vaccinated and the unvaccinated. The disease of my childhood was infantile paralysis or as it is more commonly known, polio. All over the United States, the summer months were considered the most dangerous time of year when people were most likely to sicken with this devastating illness. The photographs of polio patients in an iron lung were frightening to all. The most famous person who suffered from the aftereffects of polio was the New York Governor, Franklin Roosevelt. The most well-known treatment for polio victims was the Sister Kinney method. One summer when I was in middle school was a particularly bad year for the disease. Among the many resulting restrictions was the summer closure of the public swimming pool where my family lived. My younger sister, Kathy, needed to have her tonsils removed, but the surgery ...

I didn’t expect to go anywhere this past year, not after COVID 19 hit.   But it was a trip I had to take, as did many of those around me.  They even coined a name for it, “Vaccine Tourism”.   In reality, it was often more like a junkie trying desperately to get a fix.   Frustration led to the trip for most. Those in powerful positions who were supposed to protect us, didn’t.  When vaccine s   were   finally available , instead of distributing them in a logical realistic manner by population, our Governor in the State of Missouri, chose to distribute the vaccines  equally to each of the  State Highway P atrol Districts.  No one is quite sure why that di stribution pattern  was chosen .  The Highway Patrol had nothing to do with dispensing the vaccines, b ut vaccines were sent to  rural  areas with sparse populations, rather than to the densely populated m etropolitan areas of St Louis and Kansas City.   ...