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In 1952, more than 21,000 Americans were afflicted with a viral infection which left them paralyzed. In the same year, a number in excess of 300 were killed by the same disease.

Infantile paralysis, or Polio as you may better know it, was a disease that afflicted children, and as it turned out, I went to school with a few of them. For those like myself who can remember the era of Polio, kids we knew with the disease were obvious because they had to wear heavy metal braces on their legs, and walked with crutches strapped to both arms, dragging their useless limbs to get around. President Roosevelt, is probably the most notable victim of Polio, and evidence that this disease and others like it, have no respect for social distinctions. In 1958, a vaccine to inoculate kids against Polio became a reality, and just about all of us from that time can remember first getting the shots, and later the oral form of the vaccine. By the mid 1970's Polio was wiped out.

Polio, was certainly not the only dread viral infection back in the day. Whooping Cough (Pertussis), Smallpox, Mumps, Measles, Chickenpox, and Tuberculosis, were all highly contagious childhood diseases that had devastating effects on Americans before vaccines were developed to eradicate them. In fact, in some areas of the world, these diseases still account for hundreds of thousands of deaths each year, and many more carry the scars left by these viral scourges on their bodies.

This morning on ABC's Good Morning America, they did a story about new outbreaks of Measles in the U.S., among children who were not vaccinated. The fact that children have not been vaccinated for Measles, and most likely some of the more devastating diseases I have mentioned, is at least alarming, or should be, to every American. But what is more egregious, is the reason that these kids are not getting vaccinated, or more appropriately being denied these life saving vaccinations. We could perceive parents preventing the vaccination of their children, as an act of civil disobedience from a political perspective, or perhaps a behavioral paradigm sponsored by radical ideological factions. But through the eyes of at least one American, who has seen the horrors and heartbreak these diseases can cause if unchecked, the denial of vaccines to kids could better be framed as an issue of human rights, and the inalienable right to "life liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

Think about it. How might you feel, if you were grossly

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