Why do people refuse to vaccinate their children against measles or whooping cough? In many cases, because they have never seen measles and have no idea what it might do.
Interpretation
People often reject vaccinations due to a lack of firsthand experience with the diseases they prevent.
This quote highlights a significant issue in public health: the decisions people make regarding vaccinations can often stem from ignorance or unfamiliarity with the consequences of diseases like measles and whooping cough. The lack of personal experience with these illnesses can lead to complacency and refusal to protect children, demonstrating the importance of education and awareness in health choices.
In practice
During a public health seminar about vaccinations.
If there is anything more frightening than the threat of global nuclear war, it is the certainty that humans not only stand on the verge of producing new life forms but may soon be able to tinker with them as if they were vintage convertibles or bonsai trees.
The Maldives, a string of islands off the coast of India whose highest point above sea level is eight feet, may be the first nation to drown. In Alaska, entire towns have begun to shift in the loosening permafrost.
Humanity has nearly suffocated the globe with carbon dioxide, yet nuclear power plants that produce no such emissions are so mired in objections and obstruction that, despite renewed interest on every continent, it is unlikely another will be built in the United States.
Be sceptical, ask questions, demand proof. Demand evidence. Don't take anything for granted. But here's the thing: When you get proof, you need to accept the proof. And we're not that good at doing that.
There are people who could watch a hurricane like Sandy blow out of the Atlantic every other day and blame it on anything but human activity. They are like those who, having been diagnosed with diabetes, eat donuts for breakfast. There's not much to do about them.
The natural force within each of us is that greatest healer of all.
What's the ultimate price I'll pay if I don't stop this indulgence now? By asking questions like this, they'll associate pain to overeating, and their behavior will change immediately.
Most people, when they hear the disease name, it's all they know about it. It sounds so mild. When I first was sick, for the first 10 years or so, I was dismissed. I was ridiculed and told I was lazy. It was a joke.
Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.
Abortion politics have distracted all sides from what is really essential: a major aid campaign to improve midwifery, prenatal care and emergency obstetric services in poor countries.
Having been hit by drug addiction, knowing how many are hit by it and what a big problem it is in our neighborhoods and our culture, I feel a responsibility to do something. I can see what's wrong with the system - that we have to recognize mental illness as we do cancer or broken bones - and how we need to make it better.
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