TANS sufferers need immediate aid,
protection
Thousands if not millions of Amerians may have been shocked by the CDC’s recent announcement of an epidemic called TANS which threatens the lives of countless Amerian teenagers. But there’s a mother I know who greeted the revelation with a sense of relief bordering on ecstasy.
“I knew there was a big problem,” said the woman I’ll call Marguerite. She’s a successful, well spoken stock broker with degrees from two eminent universities. “When I’d go home and try to talk to my two teenage kids, they’d fall asleep in mid-sentence. But I couldn’t get my doctor to acknowledge that this was abnormal.”
Now the CDC has confirmed that it is abnormal. TANS stands for Teenage Narcoleptic Syndrome. Teens fall asleep or go into trance at the drop of a hat—whether they’re talking to Mom or driving a car. It’s a disease that kills. As many as three million teens may already have it, yet Marguerite’s doctor told her the symptoms were “an attention span issue.”
“It’s a lot more than that,” Marguerite fumed. “They can’t do their homework or read two pages of a book without falling asleep. They go into trance watching MT Videos, and I can’t snap them out of it. They can barely get through a meal without having to take a nap.”
Bizarrely, though, TANS sufferers are often nighttime insomniacs, staying up most or all of the night to talk with their friends on the phone. But during daylight hours, or when they’re all alone, they’re at constant risk of dozing off without warning.
Marguerite disputes the CDC’s speculation that TANS is a sexually transmitted virus. “My kids can’t stay awake long enough at a stretch to get sexually involved,” she declared. “It’s not like they’re having an ‘attack’ of sleep, the way the CDC talks about it. It’s more like sleep is their natural state, and they keep falling back into it.”
If life with TANS victims has been so difficult, why is Marguerite so happy about the CDC’s announcement?
“Because maybe now they’ll be able to get some help,” she said. “The CDC could find a cure—or if we have to wait for that, at least we’ll know what kinds of things must be done to protect them in the interim. I liked the recommendations about driving age and regulation of machinery, for example.”
The CDC is recommending that kids not be permitted to get drivers’ licenses until age twenty-one. They are also proposing that teens not be permitted to work with certain kinds of household equipment such as garbage disposals, steam irons, and lawnmowers.
“My husband used to scoff when I told him I was afraid to have our son cut the lawn or our daughter iron her clothes,” Marguerite explained. “He told me I was overreacting, and said the kids were just lazy and spoiled. He actually refused to take over the job of mowing the lawn. He’s singing a different tune now.”
Hopefully, millions of Amerian parents will be singing a different tune from now on. The sad truth is that we can’t afford to let our kids perform ordinary household chores anymore. They’re just too dangerous.
“I’m happy to do what’s necessary,” Marguerite said. “I’ll drive them, and cook for them, and do their laundry, and cut the grass for them if I have to. I just want them to live.”
That’s what we all want, Marguerite. Thank God for the CDC.
Health Beat is a regular Star feature contributed by columnist Midge Mertle.