I am getting ready for a trip to Nepal with my dear friend Bobby – celebrating a lifetime of ministry partnership together. Seeing the Himalaya’s and Mt. Everest will knock off a bucket list item for sure. No we are not climbing Everest

I had to get caught up on my vaccinations – including measles, hepatitis and yellow fever. I feel like Superman now! But it got me thinking vaccines and our modern capabilities. Truly one of the greatest human achievements. Vaccines have been a key part of the amazing increases in life expectancy in recent history. In 1900 worldwide life expectancy was 31. Today it is 71…and growing fast. Most of that increase has come in just the last four generations.

Edward Jenner used the term vaccination in 1796 because his vaccine for smallpox was from cows (Latin vacca “cow”). Since then, many vaccines have been developed saving countless lives. Maurice Hilleman may be the champion in terms of lives saved with his measles vaccine in 1968. Measles is estimated to have killed about 200 million people. He developed 25 other vaccines – including many still used with children.

Vicky and I were able to sit in on a personal telling of the fascinating story of how the original COVID vaccines was developed. Francis Collins, former head of NIH (and evangelical Christian), and key vaccine researcher Kizzmekia Corbett-Helaire told of the mixture of great science, new research tools, global cooperation, and some good fortune (they were already researching a similar virus – and so got a running start).

The COVID vaccine was developed in record time – less than one year. The previous record for a vaccine development was the mumps in the 1960’s which took 4 years. My gut feeling

is that the whole experience with the development, production and distribution of COVID vaccines will prove a beneficial “trial run” in the future when the virus could be even more deadly.

Modern science is bringing us incredible capabilities to fight diseases. The current goal is to develop a vaccine for any unforeseen pathogen within 30 days! Vaccines will also become personal – designed for our specific genome. I received a custom-made experimental cancer vaccine in 1998 at Stanford to treat Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma – in which a piece of my tumor was extracted, genetically manipulated and then “vaccinated” back into my body to fix my immune system.

Thank you God for vaccines.