Ignorance is not bliss. Not now, not ever.

What you don’t know can kill you, especially when quacks are involved.

In 1953, there was no vaccine for polio. Many families, including mine, were destroyed by the effects of this virus. The virus caused physical defects in their victims’ extremities and more, caused by irreparable damage to their neuromuscular systems. My mother tried to defend us from the virus with camphor hanging in small bags from our necks because that’s all that there was.

In 2025, if you live in a country that can afford to stock a vaccine, you have no excuse to have your kids and your family destroyed by this virus. Or do you? Are conspiracy theories a good excuse?

Kids died in Texas in 2025, when all it takes is a visit to a doctor to give your kid a vaccine. Now, babies are killed by pertussis (whopping cough). An infectious disease will come back from “eradication” once vaccination rates drop below a certain percentage. You can try cod liver oil. But, I tell you, in 1951, my mother tried folk medicine, and camphor didn’t work. As soon as a vaccine became available, we got it; first the Salk, then the Sabin. It was too late for my younger brother. Many decades later, I got the COVID-19 vaccine, and as soon as I was allowed to do so, I felt so lucky to get it!

I am not naive. I know that science is a human activity and, as such, is subject to human problems. Science is not perfect because humans are not. However, the scientific method is the best tool we have to determine whether something works or not. Camphor doesn’t work; vaccines do.

References

Testa, Daniela. (2018)  Del alcanfor a la vacuna Sabin. La Polio en aa Argentina. 2018, p. 207. Ed. Biblios.

 Hajar R. The Air of History (Part II) Medicine in the Middle Ages. Heart Views. 2012 Oct;13(4):158-62. doi: 10.4103/1995-705X.105744. PMID: 23437419; PMCID: PMC3573364.