Monday, February 9, 2009

Mumps in Macedonia

There has been a mumps outbreak in Macedonia, due to the complete lack of vaccinations for an entire generation of children in the mid-90's, who are now in high school.

This has caused all of my twenty-something American friends to look at each other curiously and engage in the following conversation:

"Mumps? Do people still get that?"
"I think it's like the Chicken Pox?"
"Did we get vaccinated for that? How long does that last?"
"I don't remember, man."
"Me either. I should probably call my mom."

So, how 'bout it, Ma? Can I go outside without a surgical mask over my face, Japanese-style?

Eric and Justin have nice write-ups of the events. Here's a news item about it.

2 comments:

Gezuar said...

so is this something that could spread to say, other countries??? my mom would not be happy to hear about such things...

Beth S. said...

Hi Seth! Nice blog! I have to get caught up on reading it but it sounds like you are having a most interesting year. Macedonia looks like some kind of magical land. Very nice. I bet you are getting pretty proficient in Macedonian now. Unfortunately, the other day my cousins asked me to say "The apple is red" in Macedonian and I could not remember a single word. Then they asked me to say anything at all and I still couldn't think of anything. I'm taking Japanese now. Well, anyway, hopefully you don't get mumps!