The scar near my shoulder

The other day I watched a talk given by Larry Brilliant at TED.  The talk is from back in 2006 in which he talks about preventing future epidemics and then also talks about smallpox and how he helped rid India of smallpox, working there in the early 70s.  When he showed pictures of people with the smallpox blisters, it triggered a memory...

While Larry was helping WHO fight smallpox, I was in first grade in India and our entire school was vaccinated against smallpox in one day.  The doctor set up his station in a long corridor and we all queued up, rolling up our sleeves and getting vaccinated on the upper forearm near the shoulder.  I have always been afraid of needles and was physically trying to bolt from the queue.  My teacher, Shashi Dhamija, intercepted me and showed me a similar picture of someone suffering from smallpox and convinced me that getting vaccinated is not such a bad idea.  As a result, I too have the scar (an irregular circle)  that I had seen on the upper arms of my parents, my aunts and uncles and my cousins.  Not quite a merit badge, it is a reminder that we have been enlisted as soldiers in the fight against smallpox.

The other day I was listening to NPR (National Public Radio) and there was a lengthy article about children in USA who are not getting immunized against measles, mumps, chickenpox and the rest. And these are not children of poor parents who either cannot afford the vaccinations or do not grasp the utility of such vaccinations. These are children of well-educated, well-off people who think that vaccines are either dangerous and cause various diseases/illnesses/syndromes such as autism or that these diseases are caused by the vaccines themselves!

I felt angry at these parents because I feel that they are risking their children's health, both short- and long-term, and they are also risking the health of the population in general (by diluting the herd immunity). I am not saying that vaccines do not carry risks or errors are not made or that certain vaccines are losing their potency. But thinking that vaccines simply do not work and it is all a conspiracy perpetuated by a vast cabal of doctors, researchers and vaccine makers is, well, asinine.

It took an army of doctors, nurses and social workers to go door to door all over the globe, educating people regarding the benefits of vaccination and immunizing people and teaching them about the symptoms to eradicate smallpox.  It was a momentous feat - tackling a disease that used to kill millions and corralling the last remnants of the virus to a few freezers in a handful of labs.  With the right vaccines and the right infrastructure, we can reduce many diseases to the same fate as smallpox, locked in a freezer.  But it requires volunteers - to join the ranks of the immunized - which seem to be in short supply these days.  And to add insult to injury, it is not just the ill-educated who are shirking.  Please, get the word out.  Go out and get vaccinated!

TCO - How to think like a Capitalist

There you are standing in the computer store trying to decide between two printers, A and B. Both have the same features, same warranties, same manufacturer and can be expected to last 5 years. The difference? A costs $50 and B $100 and B costs about 1 cent per page to print while A costs 5 cents a page (special paper). Which one should you buy?

Well, you could do "eeny meeny miney moe" or you could employ a capitalist tool called "Total Cost of Ownership" or TCO. This is a good measure of true cost. For example, you print about 10 pages a week or roughly 500 pages a year. So, over the lifetime of the printers, you would be printing 2500 pages. So, A would cost you $50 + 2500 x 5 cents or $175 while B would set you back $100 + 2500 x 1 cent or $125. I guess the cheaper printer would come out more expensive! Of course, if all you do is print one page a week or roughly 250 pages over the 5 year period, the TCO would be $62.50 and $102.50 respectively.

The above example is, of course, extremely simplistic. In real life, you may be comparing completely different technologies or different services with different guarantees etc. You may not even be able to predict your own behavior! But, if you compute TCO consistently, you can get a good feel for the costs and perhaps it would force you to figure out exactly how much you are going to use your new purchase.

So, big deal! Why is it so important? Well, TCO is a tool that we should employ in our daily lives but we don't. For example, many of us do not realize how much that must-have sweater really costs when you carry a balance on your credit card. Similarly, when we buy an inexpensive jacket that lasts just a year or two, we may end up paying a lot more in the long run than buying an expensive but durable jacket.

Another time we should employ TCO is when we are buying a car. We often pay far more attention to the price than to the costs of regular maintenance, fuel, insurance and what the vehicle would fetch when we want to replace it with a newer car.  You will find that the initial cost of the car (the purchase price) gets swamped by these"extras".  Similarly, when you renting or buying a residence, try to figure the costs of heating and cooling.  You will find that a well-insulated house is worth some extra dollars.

Anyways, keep TCO in mind the next time you are shopping for anything or even deciding whether to drive your own car or a rental on a road trip.  The results just might shock you...

Postcard from Europe #2

Long time back I was once traveling from Germany to Greece by train and ferry and I met a bunch of American college students who were going my way. We traded stories and tips on places to stay and things to do. We changed trains in Milan and had some time to kill. One of the fellow travelers looked up a sheet of paper from her backpack and got really excited. "There is a McDonald's right outside the station! We don't have to go far!".

Huh?

Well, as it turns out, the beautiful Milano Centrale was right across the street from a McDonald's. But weren't we coming from the land of McDonald's? We could always have a happy meal back home. But, the Golden Arches beckoned my fellow Americans and despite my pleas to look elsewhere, they went off for cheeseburger and coke. I browsed through a few shops and soon had my hands on panini and gelato. We gathered up in the park right outside McDonald's where we compared notes.

I hate to gloat (well, maybe just a little bit...) but I think I came out far ahead in our quest for good food. My fellow travellers discovered to their horror that they had just spent a rather large amount of money (Italian Lire were confusing) on the food that they thought would be fairly inexpensive while I not only came out cheaper, but my food was not "icky" or "weird".

The lesson was not forgotten by them when we disembarked from our next train in Brindisi and found a small trattoria just a few blocks off the beaten path where the food was good, portions were large and the price was very very sweet.

But why is all this important? Well, back in 2000, the American people (s)elected a guy that they would feel comfortable drinking beer with. And less than 8 years later, we are in deep trouble. Now, we have two candidates - John McCain who, despite his "maverick" moniker, is in lockstep with the outgoing guy on most issues and Barak Obama who seems to be a step in a new direction. Now, there are many Americans who feel that Obama is an untested choice and thus feel that they should stick with a familiar face. Well, my good friends, this is not the time to grope for the familiar. The scrutiny of Obama over the last two years has revealed a guy who is a decent choice. No, he cannot fix all the problems faced by our country right away. But at least he has a good head on his shoulders and a team of advisors that anyone should be proud of.

As my fellow travellers learned, reaching for the familiar doesn't always get you the best deal. You do want a good deal, don't you?