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America's lack of universal health insurance even hurts the old folks on Medicare. Sponsor this page This page last updated on or about late 9-25-07 a - j m o o n e y h a m . c o m - o r i g i n a l

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America's lack of universal health insurance even hurts the old folks on Medicare. Why? Because they have fewer natural defenses against infectious disease than younger folks. And worse, they suffer far bigger exposures to same than anyone younger-- simply because they've been around longer.

Some infectious diseases are as insidious as smoking, maybe not showing any symptoms at all for 10-30 years, then BOOM! Either you reach a certain age milestone, or something else triggers or allows that bug to finally explode throughout your system, and you're either badly afflicted (possibly for the rest of your life)-- or quickly dead.

Flu though is close to an 'instant breakfast' contagious malady. An old person can get sick and die from it in a matter of days (or suffer for months, if it leads to complications like pneumonia).

Both the fast and slow acting infectious diseases have no better place to develop and multiply than a nation's medically uninsured population.

And yes: a bio-weapon released by terrorists, or an enemy state-- or simply by accident from our own evil bioweapons research-- will also happily explode all over us any chance it gets, using our own uninsured citizens as a rich spawning ground.

So what's an old person's best defense? Not things like flu shots! For the number of preventative vaccinations available for dangerous contagions is truly tiny-- and even the handful that are available don't appear to help old folks much.

No, the best way to keep the elderly from getting sick is making sure everyone else stays healthy, so they can't give the bugs to the old people in the first place! There's just no way around it.

On the bright side, this same solution also protects the little children. On the dark side, Republicans don't seem to like either old folks or little children very much-- except as easy targets and victims.

-- Study Questions Flu Shot's Value for Older People; September 25, 2007; washingtonpost.com

-- In the very worst real-world calamities to ever strike mankind throughout history, only Clark Kent-- not Superman-- could have saved the day.

-- They did WHAT!?! The dirty deeds of Republicans get little attention in the mainstream media-- partly because they're often so heinous and unbelievable

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