GOING BANANAS IN B SCHOOL


Tuesday, April 22, 2008

There's a Disease With My Name on It

As part of the process of getting myself ready for b school, I have to show proof of immunization. I have no clue how to read the immunization form. There's numbers and subscripts all over the chart that I can't decipher. The bad thing is that the numbers are 0, 1, 2, and 3. Really, it doesn't go higher than that. Looking at my past immunization history (which is disjointed and a bit on the chaotic side, with part of it in Chinese), it seems that some doctor or clinic missed something along the way.

The first shot I needed was TD. Or DT. Whatever. Its the tetanus-diphtheria shot. No biggie since it only runs for 10 years and the last shot I got was back in 1992. I'm ok with that. But...I needed 2 measles, 2 mumps, and 1 rubella shot, or two MMRs-which is the wicked trifecta. Somehow, I am missing one mumps shot. I have no idea how that one happened, since the shots are usually given together. According to the clinic, most people get their first MMR shot after their first birthday, and then another one basically whenever. I have the 'whenever' one back in 1992, but I don't have the one after my first birthday. How my undergraduate school (UT) and my law school (Santa Clara) accepted me without one of the shots is beyond me. Oh wait. Measles, mumps, and rubella aren't all that prevalent in the United States.

Will someone please tell my b school that? The MMR shot alone costs $125. The tetanus shot $50. And then an administrative fee of $25 (folding one sheet of paper in half and writing my name on it with the two shots I received). All together? $200 bucks. The MMR vaccine is what they call a 'live' vaccine. Which means that a few days after my shot I should expect to be a bit sick. 200 fucking dollars. And I could probably go to some third world country and get a dose of MMR just by breathing the air.

3 comments:

Terri @findingdrishti.com said...

the only shot i've gotten recently was a tetanus booster. i didn't have to show anything to UT for grad school since i had undergrad there. i think they just assumed that i had everything before i started as a freshman and it still applies.

Backpacking Dad said...

I had to get a new MMR when I studied abroad a few years ago. My home clinic also had no "post one year" record so I had to catch up.

Anonymous said...

Wow...all of a sudden I'm glad I live somewhere with free immunizations.

Good luck with all that.