Saturday, March 15, 2008

R's Letter to Oprah

All, I always welcome comments and suggestions for my drafts. Thanks. R
_________

Dear Oprah,

You gave us good t.v. with your production of “Tuesdays with Morrie.”

Please think about the possibilities of “Wednesdays with Ken” and “Thursdays with Betty” and “Fridays with Joe.” Morrie Schwartz gave us wonderful lessons in living and dying. We have thousands of Americans who would like a chance to use more of the living lessons and fewer of the dying variety.

As you well know, Morrie’s disease was Lou Gehrig’s disease and it’s Ken’s disease and Betty’s and Joe’s, too. All these years after Lou Gehrig, it continues to be a medical mystery that forces talented people into making the most of a very short time.

This qualifies as an American public health problem that we’ve failed to address adequately. It qualifies as an American outrage when we consider that our veterans are slapped with the diagnosis at a rate far higher than the rest of us.

Every May advocates gather in Washington, DC, to try to get the ears of our legislators so that we might address the problem that we know as ALS. These aren’t the highly paid lobbyists eating the expensive lunches on K Street. These are Ken and Betty and Joe and families who overcome great obstacles just to get there. Please take a look at http://www.rolloverals.org/ .

In 1939 the disease had a big voice in Lou Gehrig. Unfortunately he and Morrie and almost half a million others have since died from ALS. This is a public health problem without a big voice. Please add your voice.


Sincerely,

2 comments:

RCB said...

Very eloquent! I modified my letter to include the link to the Roll Over ALS site. I noticed one mistake -- "veterans as" should be "veterans are" I think.

rknt50 said...

Thanks for the eagle eye, rcb. Have a good weekend.