Simplicity vs. Safety

So one of the key principles I try to live my life by is that of “simplicity”. Gandhi said that we should live simply so that others may simply live. Thus, I need to be using my resources with the mindset that I’m called to be a good steward of them, and that ultimately all humanity is in this thing called life together -- so I need to be looking to meet the needs of others and not just my own wants. While there are obviously dozens of ways in which I DON’T do this, I’m learning to reprogram my mind as much as possible to see things from a global, even eternal perspective… and one of the most tangible ways this plays out is in how I spend my money. Again, I admit from the get-go that I suck at this in a lot of ways. But, in general, I’ve learned that if I cut down on a lot of my needless expenses, it frees up a lot of money to do better things with. So, I’m not gonna buy the $20 bottle of shampoo when the $3 one works just fine, and I’m not going to spend $80 on a pair of earrings, when I can find some half-way cute ones for $5 (especially since I’m prone to frequently losing jewelry anyway.) However, my stick-to-the-minumum-expense-neccesary philosophy recently hit a snag…

On Friday I went to the Passport Health office for my appointment to get the needed vaccinations for our Sudan trip. I knew that in addition to taking malaria pills, that I was going to need to at least get a yellow fever vaccine, and probably a few more shots too. So I go in and meet the doctor, and she goes through her talk about being a safe traveler, and about the risks for Sudan in particular. Then she goes through all the vaccinations that are suggested for the trip, and then gives the prices for them all. Granted, I’d budgeted SOME money for this, but I was a little taken back by the final price tag. Total cost if I want to be super safe and get ALL the recommended shots: $1,037. Yea right. I could buy a plane ticket to fly to another country for medical attention for that amount. So, I ration in my head that I’m obviously not getting ALL the recommended shots (which, from what I’ve heard, few people actually do.) Legally I just have to spend the $125 for the yellow fever shot and they’ll let me into Sudan, but I know it’s probably a good idea to get a least a couple of the other recommended ones. Which left me sitting in the doctor’s office, contemplating how likely it is that I would actually catch get any of this stuff, and just how much money is a good idea to spend. Would I rather spend $85, or risk getting typhoid fever? $135, or meningitis? $87, or measles? (Apparently, even though I already had that vaccine as a kid, “they” now recommend that anyone born after 1956 get two does of MMR, not one. Of course.) The simple-spender in me was saying “Just get the yellow fever and you’ll be fine.” The don’t-be-stupid-voice in me was saying “Better to be overly safe than sorry when dealing with foreign diseases.” Of course, part of being a 20-something living underneath a fear-mongering government is that I can be pretty distrustful of a lot of major institutions, especially any one where drug companies are making a profit by convincing me that I really need such-and-such medications, whether it’s true or not.

Contemplating all of this in my head while the doctor got the needles ready, I finally decide that for the day, I was just going to get the shots for yellow fever and for Hepatitis A&B. Those seem to be the most urgent, and I figure that even though the Hep A&B are by far the most expensive of the vaccines, I’m going to need to get those if I ever travel overseas again anyways, so mind as well get it out of the way. I had to make another appointment to get my second round of Hep shots before we leave for Africa, and I assure the doctor that I’ll probably get more of the other vaccines on my next visit. I haven’t actually decided if I am or not, but at least I’ve got a couple of weeks to do some more reading and see which ones I’m actually in need of.

It actually brings to mind a lot of thoughts about the whole struggle between living-in-fear vs. being-needlessly-reckless. But, that’s a whole other post, and I’ve got to get ready for work tonight. Maybe I’ll write more on that later…