A poor shot at protection

This past Tuesday the Washington Post reported that U.S. officials believe four nations outside the United States have unauthorized smallpox samples. Inevitably, smallpox will be used as a biological agent against us. Why else would various rogue states be manufacturing it as though they were turning out eggnog for Christmas? Why have they inoculated their citizens against smallpox if they do not intend to use it in bio warfare?

Your representatives in Washington have given George the Second unlimited dictatorial power to fight the "war on terrorism." The government can, and, I believe, WILL force you to have a smallpox vaccination. You will have a choice between submission or detention in a prison which they will call a "quarantine" center.

I have difficulty with this issue because (1) we don't know if the smallpox vaccination they are (supposedly) preparing for us will work, (2) there is a treatment available that will work but you will not have access to it (photo therapy) so, reluctantly (3) you should submit to the smallpox vaccine since it is the only hope you have. With a scientific illiterate such as Tommy Thompson in charge of Health & Human Services, you might want to consider a trip to Russia for inoculation. 

Radiologists don't get the picture

For 20 years, I have been railing against the indiscriminate use of ultrasound on unborn children. For the parents-to-be, the picture of their precious baby in its earliest months of life is irresistible. The radiologist will say it is safe-if the topic is brought up at all.

But it just doesn't seem wise to me to bombard a very delicate and vulnerable fetus with the powerful energy of an ultrasound. What could it do to vision, the delicate mechanism of the inner ear, and the brain itself? I don't recall anyone saying it would be BAD for the fetus, but I guess they didn't say it would be GOOD either. I have always advised against it but, as far as I know, no one has ever taken my advice.

Swedish researchers, reporting in the journal Epidemiology, have presented some compelling findings that will hopefully get the attention of the ultrasonographers. (They will, of course, decry the study's results.) The investigators found that mothers who underwent ultrasound scanning were more likely to have children who show signs of subtle brain damage later in life.

The Swedish scientists compared almost 7,000 men whose mothers underwent scanning in the 1970s with 170,000 men whose mothers did not get scanned. They looked for differences in the rates of left- and right-handedness. This may sound a little odd but it was a clever idea since the incidence of left-handedness has increased dramatically since the advent of this high-tech, and usually unnecessary, "photo opportunity." Subtle brain damage can cause people who ought genetically to be right-handed to become left-handed.

Victims of this sort of brain damage face a higher risk of conditions like learning disabilities, allergies, autoimmune diseases, epilepsy, and mental disorders like depression and schizophrenia. This does not mean to imply there is anything abnormal about being left-handed per se. But this trait can sometimes be useful in identifying things in the body that might actually be abnormal.

Despite these findings, a member of the research team - Professor Juni Palmgren of the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm - stated: "I would urge people not to refuse to have ultrasound scanning, as the risk of brain damage is only a possibility - but this is an interesting finding and needs to be taken seriously." Right. Then why take a chance just for a picture in a scrap book? How many of these doctors who are recommending that parents do it regardless of the risk, are having THEIR children assaulted with this zap gun?

When it comes to your own children or grandchildren, tell the doctor that if he bombards your little developing wonder with ultrasound, you're going to sue him for $10 million. Have him sign a statement - and have the radiologist sign it too - that ultrasound will not be used without your permission. (Chances are, in a courtroom, they would deny having promised not to assault your baby unless you have it in writing.)