phinnia | clickies

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man wins lawsuit against polio vaccine maker after he was infected with polio through his daughter's poop. she'd had a live oral vaccine. talk about one in a million odds. more information here.

(you just know there's going to be at least one fool out there that won't get their child vaccinated now because of this.)

biker brawl in sydney airport.

rare star to supernova link established.

deadly nerve toxin affects deep sea creatures.

today, things are even more boring than yesterday. more cleaning, some unpacking, blah blah blah, boring. not even nice enough to go to the park.

this coming week is my last week of freedom before yet another week of pointless school holidays. good times. or something. i hate our school board for this; unfortunately transferring him to another district is nowhere near feasible, and us moving to another district is even worse if we want to do things like get around during the day (chris can't drive and neither can i, although for entirely different reasons.)

*suppresses the usual rant* where would i go to get an explanation for the number of idiotic school holidays?

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I didn't know they still vaccinated for polio... Huh. Anyway, there'd have to be a virus-to-blood transmission, I should think. So either he had a cut on his hand, in which case he shouldn't have been touching poo, or he didn't wash his hands after, and then touched, dunno, his mouth or something, in which case, gross.

Some people...

Although I know a guy who didn't change his daughter's diapers for more than a month after she was born. I (the babysitter) changed her diaper before he did. That's just sad. :-(

oh no, it's an oral 'vaccine' (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polio_vaccine).they don't do that so much now, but this has been trying to be settled for the past 30 years.

and yes, they do still vaccinate for polio. the bacteria are still hanging around out there (and there are some people who can't be vaccinated - people with certain allergies, people that have had bad reactions to previous vaccines, people with compromised immune systems) so the more people that get vaccines. the less likely it is for these people to be exposed to those illnesses. does that make sense? this is why i get so utterly pissed at idiots that don't vaccinate their kids because of some lies they've heard on oprah by that goddamn playboy bunny bitch who thinks that having an autistic kid makes her a health care expert ...
sorry about that. i got rant on you.

Okay, so it's an inactive/dead virus taken orally... gotcha. Seems a bit odd. Seems even odder that it could be transmissed to another person. Huge long shot. He must have been incredibly unlucky. But what I meant is that the virus from the vaccine (whether active or inactive) would have had to travel into her poo, and then into his bloodstream from said poo.

Yeah, I think it's stupid that people don't get their kids vaccinated, unless there's an obvious reason not to (like, I almost died from the pertussis vaccine the first time, so I wasn't given it again, obviously). But perfectly healthy kids not getting their measles vax for some idiotic, unproven propaganda-laden reason, and then going and dying from measles. Ridiculous. These 'killer' measles vaccines are given at 18 months, most autistic kids start showing the more obvious signs around then, not a stretch to say it's just a coincidence. But they just won't believe it. *sigh*

I think polio is specifically fecal-to-oral. Meaning that it is, in fact, very likely that he changed her diaper and didn't wash his hands well enough.

(I guess fecal-to-blood would probably work. I can't imagine why it wouldn't, at least.)

I'm not sure this belongs in courts as a lawsuit, though. It sounds more like something that should get reimbursement for the special fund that deals with vaccination problems.

i think that's where the money came from? not sure. one of those links is the actual legal brief from the case, so there were lawyers involved somewhere.

I am constantly surprised at how many school holidays he gets! Granted, I'm a bit jealous because I would like more time off of work (OMG I DO NOT WANT TO GO BACK TOMORROW SERIOUSLY PHIN WHAT DO I DO), but mostly it just seems ridiculous.

My high school (private Catholic deal) got a lot more days off than the public school kids. I miss that sometimes.

The Montessori school that I work at stays on the same schedule (for the most part) as the public schools in the district. I think it mostly makes sense for parents that have children in different schools, though once in a while they'll get a holiday that we don't and it does not make me happy...

*hugglomp* soon you'll be an overworked underpaid grad student? (is that a step up, or just laterally?)

I'll go with a step up... BECAUSE PHIN GUESS WHAT I JUST GOT OFFERED A FELLOWSHIP AND I GET MORE $$$ EACH YEAR.

Yay :] I just found out and nobody is answering their phonnnnes

eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeOMG OMG OMG OMG OMG!!!!!!!!!

THAT FUCKING OWNS.

So, what school holidays does Sean get? I guess schools here are broadly the same as when I was at school, ie:

two weeks off at Easter
ten days to two weeks off at Christmas/New Year
6-7 weeks off over the Summer
three half-term breaks of one week each, in mid-February, end May/early June, late October
1 day for May Day (all other public holidays fall within the above)
up to three days (one per term) off as statutory teacher training days

Things vary around the country (ie different public holidays in Scotland & NI), and for private schools.

You know, I love you and all, but when you rant about school holidays it tends to hit rather close to home. Different situations for different people --- I need those school holidays for semi-CFS-healing-time.

But still, I wish I could look after Sean for you. Pity about the geography thing.

*takes foot out of mouth*
*facepalm*
very true; and i am intensely sorry. you're right, there is another side to it which i hadn't considered. i have other teaching friends with similar problems, too. (and ironically i need the school days for the same reasons.)

i think part of the problem is that i don't understand what the district's reasoning is (and i'm honestly not sure where to go to find that out). if i understood what their reasoning was it would go down a lot easier. but getting an honest answer rather than some bureaucrat's party line is nearly impossible.

i'm sorry about being a completely insensitive jackass.

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