Vaccination Day
At regular intervals, the Singapore Armed Forces calls me up to stick needles into me. No obedient soldier ever questions why or what. Well, at least I asked “what is it?” today.
According to my medical records, the last time I was vaccinated by the army was in 1989(!). Wow, talking about a page in history - that was when I was still in training. So all of the vaccine protection have long expired, so its time for me to get another boost (and maybe because I’m scheduled for another training trip?)
The flavours available today were typhoid, tetanus and polio.
Typhoid, perhaps because of all the crappy food we have to put up with. But its strange because there are a host of food-related diseases that we’re not protected against: diarrhea, cholera, dysentery amongst others. Why only typhoid?
Tetanus is the most understandable, because it infects through a wound. The bacterial spores are widely found in soil, so infection is highly likely (although it seems that the conscript army avoids contact with soil so much that one wonders if the earth holds anything deadlier).
The polio vaccine was interesting because I had forgotten that this was an orally administered treatment. Or how bitter it was - blah! But at least I had one less needle being stuck into my arm by a young medical orderly barely out of his teens.