Never Mind Asking If We’ve Been To Africa – Maybe Our Border Officers Should Be Asking If We’ve Been Anywhere Near Mickey And Goofy Lately

A  Commentary  by Doug Draper

In recent months, as I’ve crossed the Peace Bridge back into my native Canada from a day trip to Buffalo in the U.S.A, I’ve routinely been asked by our border officers if I’ve been to Africa or spent any time around someone who may be infected with the Ebola virus.

Measles, a potentially fatal disease, all but eradicated in North America due to mass vaccinations, is breaking out again.

‘No’, is my honest answer and I don’t necessarily mind the question being asked.

But let’s put things in perspective. There have only been a few well-publicized cases of Ebola on the U.S. side of the border and no confirmed cases in Canada following a couple of concerns over possible cases.

On the other hand, there are now over 100 confirmed cases of measles in the United States, and at least seven in Niagara, Ontario’s Golden Horseshoe, including at least six confirmed cases in the Greater Toronto Area and one in Niagara to date.

Many of the cases in the United States have reportedly been linked, for whatever reason, to affected individuals who have visited the Disneyland amusement park in California. And many have also been to people who have never had a measles vaccine in their life.

So perhaps border officers should also be asking any and all border crossers if they have been to Disneyland lately and whether anyone in their party has ever had a measles vaccine in their life. Who knows, maybe Mickey and Goofy are carrying the measles vaccine and should be placed in quarantine for a while, just like someone might be who is suspected of being near a person with Ebola – a virus that is actually far less contagious than measles unless you come in intimate contact with the bodily fluids of an Ebola victim.

Measles is a disease that is highly contagious in a population where individuals have no protection and can, at its worst, lead to death, as it did, quite significantly in the first half of the last century before mass vaccination.

I must wonder if governments here are coming down harder on anyone who may have been exposed to Ebola because it is centred on populations of black people in Africa. On the other hand, here we are with a measles outbreak in North America that has nothing to do with Africa or the colour of one’s skin, from what anyone in the medical community can tell.

Then again, there are those libertarian types out there who insist it should be their choice whether they or their children get vaccinated for measles, polio or anything else. They don’t want government, in any way, getting in their face when it comes to vaccines for highly communicable diseases or anything else.

I say fine to this as long as those people keep their children out of public schools where my child and others go. If you don’t want to participate in the common cause when it comes to paying taxes for public health services, fine. Go create a separate community of your own out in the woods where there are no fire hydrants and you have no access to 911 emergency services, for that matter.

And by the way, March break is coming up. Go down to Disneyworld and pay my respects to Mickey and Goofy while you are at it.

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