Until I read it in the Times Colonist, I did not know that the Taliban had banned vaccinations (“Through the Lens,” Aug. 20). Of course, they might lack the education to understand the value of these modern miracles, but what is the excuse of well-educated parents in our country who refuse to protect their children while also helping to eradicate scourges like polio, diphtheria, measles, mumps and whooping cough?
I was born in the early 1930s and grew up in Ireland in an era with little or no vaccinations.
We ate extremely well then, as I still do now, with all fruits and vegetables grown in our own garden, with no pesticides and using only natural fertilizers and compost. We played outside every day, rode our bikes, swam, roller-skated, built forts and in short had great nutrition and a lifestyle that many parents today wish for their children.
Without the benefits of vaccinations, I contracted whooping cough as a tiny toddler — my mother used to tell me how she pitied me as I hung onto the side of my crib and coughed and coughed and coughed. From that I am left with bronchiectasis that damaged my left lung and reduced my lung function.
When I was in my early 30s and raising a family, I contracted both measles and mumps within a couple of years. Of course, I had never been vaccinated for these “childhood” diseases. As an adult, I was far, far sicker than any child might have been, and trying to care for my family while deathly sick was terrifying. I was lucky to have avoided some of the horrible side-effects from these diseases.
To those people I heard on a recent call-in show, who claimed that all would be well if we just ate properly and got proper exercise, I’d like to say this:
I had no cause to reproach my parents, as vaccinations were not available, but I hope your children never have to reproach you, or you have to reproach yourself, as you watch them struggling with horrible diseases like polio, diphtheria or TB, blinded by measles or left infertile by mumps.
Vaccinations are the reason that these diseases have been on the wane. Don’t let them come raging back to harm us all.
Valerie van Meel lives in French Creek.
