By Don C. Reed
One day in Champawat, India, a tiger stepped on a porcupine quill. The quill was barbed, and it broke off inside the tiger’s paw; she could not bite it out. Worse, this meant she could no longer catch her normal prey When she leaped, the quill made her flinch, so she failed to catch the deer. (1)
The tiger went up on a hillside, and studied the village for a couple of days. Selecting the weakest old man, she killed and ate him. When she grew hungry after that, she repeated the process, slaughtering hundreds .
Finally a brave villager made his way through the jungle, locating a famous hunter, James J. Corbett. He and the villager returned. But on the way back Corbett developed an earache: a massive pounding earache.
At the village, Corbett requested the body of the most recent kill, a little girl. He asked the family if they would help protect the village, using the deceased child as bait for the killer. Reluctantly, the parents agreed, and the body was tied to the base of a tree.
Corbett climbed up the tree and waited.
Around midnight, the hunter’s eardrum burst. Blood ran down the side of his face, but the pain was gone.
Framed in moonlight, the tiger snarled. Aiming his rifle ever so slowly, Corbett shot the man-eater in the face, killing it instantly.
And ever after that, if he got a headache or an earache, the hunter/naturalist would remember that moment, and say, “There is no luxury like the sudden relief from pain”.
Do you have chronic pain (long-lasting or incurable suffering)? If not now, probably you will later on, as the body ages.
For example, I have two compression fractures of the spinal column.
Every morning when I get up, a wave of sickening pain sweeps through my back. Sometimes, Tylenol will ease the pain: sometimes not.
There is at least low-grade pain all the time. I almost can’t remember what it is to be pain free.
How wonderful a cure might be — not to get better, but to be well.
However, for cures to come, for any disease or disability, there must be funding.
What is being done now (on the federal level) is just the opposite. Instead of healthy increases, enormous cuts are being inflicted on the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
Those responsible (almost exclusively Republican) may not realize the damage they are doing, taking away our hopes of cure; or, sadly, they may not care.
Did you know there is a disease with pain so great it is sometimes called the “suicide disease”. People who have it may literally want to kill themselves, because the pain is so great.Look it up; trigeminal neuralgia. (2) It is only one of dozens of diseases with their own agony.
We must Protect the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the crown jewels of medical research science; don’t let politics keep cures from happening! (3, 4)
1. Man-Eaters of Kumaon, Corbett, James J., Oxford India Paperbacks, 1993
2. https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/trigeminal-neuralgia
3. https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2025/04/16/women-and-minorities-fired-nih-board-science/
4. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gomyGxEaVS0&ab_channel=DailyBruin