Wednesday, December 14, 2005

Measles Weasels

It's a bad time to be about to have a baby in Romania. That's because there is currently a measles epidemic here. The reason there is an epidemic, despite the vaccination being compulsory, is because they ran out of vaccine a couple of years ago and nobody really did anything about it. I'm sure (at least I bloody hope) that they are solving this supply problem now, but it's a bit late as 10 kids have already died - and the point of a vaccination program is to stop any outbreak in its tracks (if more or less everyone is immune the occasional isolated cases will remain just that - isolated cases). Now I have been in small villages in Africa and have seen little tables set up under umbrellas for vaccinating all the kids of the village. If rural Uganda can manage it you'd think Romania would able to. Cretins. I think it's simple shit like this that winds me up more than mad psycho neo-cons bombing people into accepting "our values".

Or maybe it's because I'm on the verge of becoming a father.

1 comment:

Andy said...

Hang on a second - I never implied that Romania was unique in having a measles outbreak. Just I thought it was pretty pathetic that there were some people so incompetent that they ran out of vaccine and didn't get more in. I have no reason to doubt the figures you quote, so I would (and do) equally condemn those responsible for those outbreaks too.

(I like living in Romanian by the way. I think it's a beautiful country filled with a lot of wonderful people)