You Make Me Sick, by Martha Thomases – Brilliant Disguise | @MDWorld

October 26, 2014 Martha Thomases 11 Comments

Last winter, what with the heavy snow and the darkness and my particular brain chemistry, I turned into something of a hermit.  If I didn’t have to leave the house, I didn’t want to.  It was me and the cat and Judge Judy.  I was oddly content, not lonely but convinced I had all the answers.

It’s not healthy.  Maybe it was what I needed to do, the second year of my grieving, but it’s not a lifestyle I recommend for anyone looking to enjoy oneself to the fullest.  I think of it as a mental juice fast.

We seem to be going through the same thing as a nation.  And we should be just as cautious about getting stuck in the bathroom.

Are you worried about ebola?  I’m not.  Apparently, lots of people are. If you watch the network news, we’re all about to die.  The cable news is even worse.

In point of fact, it’s actually quite difficult to catch the ebola virus.  You pretty much have to be up to your elbows in vomit, urine, blood or shit, which is why the Americans who have tested positive all work in medical professions.

More people die every year from the flu, from not wearing seatbelt, and from gun accidents.  None of these is a topic of hysteria on the news.

Ebola is, however, and it’s worth discussing why.

I think, like so many problems we face in the United States, this has it’s roots in racism.  Ebola is a gruesome killer brought in from Africa, the Dark Continent.  It’s only in a few places in Africa, but that hasn’t prevented us from acting like complete lunatics.  The more hysterical among our politicians, Republican and Democrat, call for an end to flights to the affected areas, as if this will somehow prevent the disease from getting in.  Clearly, they aren’t watching The Strain, a very entertaining demonstration about why quarantines don’t work on a global scale.  Sure, maybe an infected person can’t fly from Liberia to the United States, but nothing stops that person from going to Spain, perhaps, infecting someone, and then that person, with no Liberia on his passport, could come and go as he pleases.

We don’t want to be isolationists who shun the rest of the world, sitting in our metaphorical apartments in our metaphorical bathrobes.  We want to put on metaphorical pants and be part of the world.  We might even be able to help.

You know what would be effective against ebola?  A vaccine.  There is one that might work, one that has been ready for testing for several years now.  It hasn’t been made available because the final round of tests was determined to be too expensive for the drug companies involved.  A medicine that would only be useful to poor Africans would not be the money-maker demanded by our for-profit health-care system.

So a few thousand Africans die needlessly.  At least the shareholders didn’t lose their dividends.

I don’t know why this isn’t an international scandal.  I don’t know why there aren’t criminal charges being brought against these corporations.  I don’t know why the so-called “pro-life” movement isn’t picketing them with the same fervor they demonstrate outside my doctor’s offices.

You’d almost think that the tiny fraction of the richest people and corporations in the country was trying to distract us by pitting us against each other.  You’d think they want us to forget what’s important until at least after the mid-term elections.

Don’t forget to vote.  And get your flu shot.

Martha Thomases, Media Goddess, spends too much of her life avoiding vomit, shit, blood and saliva.