Mailbag: Ignore the hype and get vaccinated

Re. “Editorial: It’s important to immunize,” (Aug. 29): I’m a native of Newport Beach, but live in Washington, D.C. I’m glad the Daily Pilot has sided with overwhelming scientific evidence showing that the benefits of vaccinating children far outweigh the risks.

Vaccines help save lives. Period. That’s easy to forget, living in the developed world.

I was reminded of this last winter when I got whooping cough.

Beginning in early October, I noticed my pesky cough was getting worse.

Without warning, a cough would cause me to expel what felt like all the air in my lungs. Afterward, I couldn’t inhale because my airways were constricted.

Trying to inhale, I often swallowed air instead, which then caused me to gag and sometimes vomit. On more than one occasion I came close to passing out due to lack of oxygen.

Like many people who get whooping cough, I was diagnosed so late (eight weeks after I started coughing) that antibiotics couldn’t help me.

Despite loads of evidence that vaccines help save lives and reduce the spread of illness, including reports out last week from the National Academy of Sciences, too many people question the effectiveness and side effects of vaccines.

If you want to live your life according to actress Jenny McCarthy, who maintains that vaccines cause autism, then it’s time to reevaluate your worldview (and get vaccinated). If you’re old enough that your immunity has diminished, get the booster shot. If you’re responsible for getting a child vaccinated, please do it now.

Heidi Schultheis

Washington, D.C.

The writer interned at the Daily Pilot in 2006 and 2007.

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Remembering Tuskegee Airmen

Re. “Mesa Musings: Center seat leads to lively talk with Tuskegee Airman” (Aug. 22): Nice column. I really enjoyed it.

My neighbor Lynn Shubert flew P-38s in World War II out of Italy. This March, I took him out to Planes of Fame Air Museum in Chino for its presentation of the Lockheed Skunk works, where the P-38s were built, and they also fired up a P-38 for a demo flight.

On Oct. 1, the museum will be doing a feature on the 82nd Fighter Group, of which he flew with while in Italy. I will be again driving him out for the presentation. Lynn turned 90 recently.

Dana F. Welch

Mission Viejo