Disneyland measles outbreak highlights the importance of vaccinations

Viruses flourish in high-density areas and vacation spots where large numbers of visitors coming together, bringing their unique colonies of pathogens. So it shouldn't be particularly surprising that an outbreak of measles has been tracked back to December visits to Disneyland in Orange County, Calif.

A total of 17 confirmed cases of measles originated with visits to the theme park, confirmed the California Department of Public Health.

Measles is highly contagious. The virus lives in the nose and throat mucus of an infected person and can be airborne, which means the virus can be coughed or sneezed into the air and land on someone else, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. To make matters worse, measles can live for up to two hours on surfaces or in the air after being sneezed or coughed out, and people can transmit the disease up to four days before and four days after developing the signature measles rash.

According to a CDC explainer, 90 percent of the unvaccinated people who come into contact with an infected person will also develop measles.

The best way to avoid getting the measles is to get two doses of a vaccine with the measles virus in it -- commonly known as the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine. Unfortunately, recent school inoculation reports indicate that vaccination rates among Californian children dropped substantially between 2007 and 2014, due to a number of factors that include discredited fears that the shots can cause autism.

That's not just bad news for the individual children who opt out, it's also problematic for the community, as demonstrated by the unrelated Disneyland visitors and workers affected: Vaccination protects those who are too young or ill to get vaccinated. For instance, six of the measles patients that the CDPH confirmed were unvaccinated, but two of them were too young to receive the shots.

Dropping vaccination rates, in addition to a globalized population with ties to parts of the world that have not yet defeated measles, have contributed to the most measles cases -- 610 patients in 2014 -- that the U.S. has seen in about 20 years, despite the fact that America technically “defeated” the disease in 2000.

“Not since 1994 have we seen this many measles cases [in the U.S.], explained Emory University School of Medicine infectious disease expert Walter Orenstein in a previous interview with The Huffington Post. “To me this is a warning sign that we need to get on the offensive against measles.”

To Orenstein, who is also a spokesperson for the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, the fight against measles is two pronged: domestically, more parents need to get their children properly vaccinated. Internationally, developing countries need help getting the virus under control.

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Beauty and the Beast as told by cats

Disney villians perform a parody of "Cell Block Tango"

Disney changes their policy for disabled patrons

Fans of Walt Disney World were fuming last spring following reports of people gaming a system that allowed disabled park guests to advance to the front of lines. Now it seems the entitled few have ruined it for everyone. Disney Parks has just announced a change in policy: People with disabilities will no longer be ushered to the front of lines.

It “certainly has been problematic, and we wanted to curb some of the abuse of this system,” Disneyland Resort spokeswoman Suzi Brown told the Orange County Register.

Further, a statement by Disney, provided to Yahoo Shine through a spokesperson, noted, "We have an unwavering commitment to making our parks accessible to all guests. Given the increasing volume of requests we receive for special access to our attractions, we are changing our process to create a more consistent experience for all our guests while providing accommodations for guests with disabilities. We engaged disability groups, such as Autism Speaks, to develop this new process, which is in line with the rest of our industry.”

According to an Associated Press report, the new policy, which takes effect on Oct. 9, will issue disabled visitors with tickets that offer an entry time and a shorter wait, similar to those of the FastPass system that’s offered to all park guests now.

The change has come in response to numerous reports of guests abusing the system.

In May, for example, social anthropologist Wednesday Martin told the New York Post about one scam in particular: wealthy Manhattan moms hiring a disabled “black-market” guide, who used her position — sitting in a motorized scooter — to help entitled families gain special access to rides. Martin, a former New York Post contributor, uncovered the scheme while conducting research for a forthcoming book, “Primates of Park Avenue,” due out in 2014.

“My daughter waited one minute to get on ‘It’s a Small World’ — the other kids had to wait 2 1/2 hours,” one unnamed mom had bragged to the Post. “You can’t go to Disney without a tour concierge ... This is how the 1 percent does Disney.”

On Monday, Martin told Yahoo Shine, "While it is admirable that Disney seeks to address abuse of and profiteering from their policy for the disabled by those who got disability passes unfairly, the park's 'solution' penalizes disabled children and adults, who were supposed to be served by the policy in the first place, by revoking their ability to go to the front of the line." She added, "This 'privilege' is actually a necessity for some kids with disabilities. Hopefully Disney will work closely with groups that advocate for people with disabilities to refine this policy so that it actually serves the people who need it the most."

Other criticisms were just beginning to hit Twitter on Monday, with one mom noting that because her daughter suffers from fibromyalgia, she would not be renewing the family's park passes. "See? One more reason we can't have nice things," tweeted another critic of the policy change.

Disney had told Yahoo Shine it was investigating the various scams back in May, and that it would “take appropriate steps to deter this type of activity.” It clearly found reason to change its rules, and, in order to formulate its new policy with sensitivity, looked to others for input.

“Disney reached out to us,” Autism Speaks spokesperson Michael Rosen told Yahoo Shine. “A large segment of our population with autism has sensory issues, so having patience to wait on noisy lines is a really hard thing.”

When Rosen has taken his own son, who has autism, to Disney World, for example, “he would start crying and screaming when we stood on a line, because he didn’t realize that in 25 minutes he would go on a ride. He had no idea why he was standing on a line, and that really takes away from the fun.”

Rosen said Autism Speaks has been urging parents concerned about the change to be patient and wait for the official release of the new policy from Disney. “We worked with them so they would make it as comfortable an experience as possible for our community,” he said.

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Disney Mean Girls

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Dads from all over the world sing "Part of Your World"

Brainwashed by Disney

Part 1

Part 2

Pogo's Monsters Inc. remix

And in case you've never heard of Pogo before...

The only good skit from Lindsay Lohan's SNL appearance

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Disney princess magazine covers

A statuesque woman stands with her back to the camera. Her blonde hair is perfectly coiffed and you can see a hint of pink lipstick peeking out as she stands in profile. Seems like a typical Elle magazine cover. Except that she's 2-D ... and her name is Cinderella.

A website has posted a series of fantastic faux magazine covers, each featuring one of Disney's leading ladies, complete with cover lines about the princess-related stories an issue devoted to that princess might contain. Check out the super cute covers below:

10 Things You Didn't Know About The Movie "Hocus Pocus"

This was the first movie I remember seeing in theaters. I guess I would have been 5 years old at the time. I feel like during the month of October this movie is shown on repeat and it still never gets old. Here are some trivia facts about the movie:

1. The role of Max Dennison was originally offered to Leonardo DiCaprio, but was given to Omri Katz when DiCaprio turned it down to appear in What's Eating Gilbert Grape.

2. After having locked the Sanderson sisters in the school kiln, the three kids celebrate as they walk to the park. The house shown directly behind Max and Thackery while they talk is the residential edifice used as Thora Birch's home in 1999's American Beauty.

3. During a February 10, 2008 interview on the BBC show "Breakfast", Bette Midler stated that out of all of her films, this was her favorite.

4. The three little girls who steal the witches' brooms from in front of the house are dressed as the sisters themselves: Winifred with red hair and green cape, Mary with black hair and red cape, and Sarah with blond hair and purple cape.

5. Rosie O'Donnell was originally offered the role of Mary Sanderson, but it was ultimately given to Kathy Najimy. O'Donnell claims on her blog that she turned down the offer to work with the Divine Miss M because she didn't want to be a "scary witch".

6. In this film, Sarah Jessica Parker plays a witch who was executed during the Salem Witch Trials in the late 1600s. While researching her family history for the show Who Do You Think You Are?, Parker was shocked to discover that her 10th great-grandmother Esther Elwell was arrested in Salem in the late 1600s for committing "sundry acts of witchcraft" and choking a neighbour to death. Esther's case never went to court, she escaped with her life and the accusation ended the Salem Witch Trials. Parker said: "It has changed everything about who I thought I was."

7. Strangely, the film was released in the Summer of 1993, rather then in the Fall.

8. Despite popular belief, Sara's song "Come Little Children" is actually a poem by Edgar Allan Poe, word for word. It was not an original song written for the film.

9. In the final scene, when Dani is crying over Binx's cat body, you can see that he happened to die right on his sister's grave.

10. The script was written as a Disney Channel Original Movie; however, it caught the eyes of a few bigger studio heads at Disney, and they felt it was strong enough to carry a good theatrical performance.

Source: imdb.com

10 things you didn't know about the movie "The Lion King"

In honor of the re-release of the Disney classic in 3-D, I thought I would put together some lesser known trivia facts about the movie.

1. The wildebeest stampede took Disney's CG department approximately three years to animate.

Also the most traumatizing scene ever. 

2. The first Disney cartoon to be dubbed into Zulu for its African release.

3. Elton John and Tim Rice were a little shocked when they saw that the producers originally intended to have their (eventual) Oscar-winning love ballad "Can You Feel the Love Tonight" as a duet between Timon and Pumbaa.

4.When Mufasa tells Simba about the Great Kings of the Past if you look at the stars in the wide shot you can see Mickey Mouse.

5. Originally, the hyenas Banzai and Shenzi were supposed to be voiced by Tommy Chong and Cheech Marin. But the directors couldn't get hold of Chong, so they cast Whoopi Goldberg as Shenzi instead.

6. The animators were so impressed with Jeremy Irons's performance that they worked Irons' features into Scar's face.

7. Originally, Scar was going to send adult Nala away from Pride Rock because she ignored his romantic approaches, after which she finds Simba alive and well with Timon and Pumbaa. This idea was ultimately abandoned, as sexual harassment was considered improper in a family movie. However, the stage musical adaptation includes this plot development as part of director Julie Taymor's efforts to expand the female characters' presence in the story.

8. The team working on the movie was supposedly Disney's "team B", who were "kept busy" while "team A" worked on Pocahontas, on which the production had much higher hopes.

9. The groundhog that pops up after Simba's pouncing lesson (the song "Morning Report" in the special edition) was originally going to be a naked mole rat, but the animators couldn't get him to look right. One of the directors said, "We would've lost our G rating!"

10. Nearly twenty minutes of the film were animated at the Disney-MGM Studios. Ultimately, more than 600 artists, animators and technicians contributed to The Lion King over its lengthy production schedule. More than one million drawings were created for the film, including 1,197 hand-painted backgrounds and 119,058 individually colored frames of film.