- RAVIOLI
Special to the Lampoon
Citizens of Texas have never been known for possessing ample wisdom. There’s an old saying, “Be smart and work with your head, or be dumb and work with your hands.” Texans have long sworn by the latter part of that proverb.
But with their legendary contributions — handheld calculators, Dr. Pepper and silicone breast implants — the rest of the U.S. was simply swept off of its feet and agreed to keep and appreciate the cattlemen and all they had to offer.
When news of the Zika outbreak in Brazil first came to U.S., it didn’t stir up too much attention. It wasn’t until rumors of an outbreak in the U.S. did the World Health Organization (WHO) decide to intervene.
WHO has consistently delivered throughout the years. It’s covered the Bird Flu, MRSA, Swine Flu and, in recent times, Ebola. With that last passionate round of hysteria running out of steam, Americans were most recently notified of a newly arrived infectious illness known as the Zika virus.
Just as the public was beginning to process this new information, it was practically thrust into a state of panic when a recent Zika diagnosis in Texas was confirmed.
Since this was the first case of Zika infection in the United States, medical research efforts hit an all time high. While medical professionals were furiously working toward understanding the disease, nobody foresaw the unexpected breakthrough that would soon occur regarding the virus’s prevalence.
However, in a state where abstinence is widely encouraged in schools, it comes as no surprise to the rest of the U.S. that this is the first documented case of sexually transmitted Zika.
One of the most shocking discoveries was that pregnant women who have travelled to areas where the virus is prevalent may transmit it to their unborn babies causing microcephaly — an abnormally small head which is at times accompanied by an underdeveloped brain.
Doctors all across America jumped at the news, taking blood samples, analyzing people’s behavior and came to a horrifying realization: just because it was the first documented case of Zika doesn’t mean that no one in the U.S. has had it before.
On the contrary, all Texans are, and always have been, afflicted with the Zika virus.
One might think, “Well, how did nobody notice their micro-craniums for all this time?” The answer is simple: While we have long attributed the IQs of Texans to their innocent charm, we have consequently failed to link their behavior to the actual pathological intelligence deficiency that accompanies the trademark small heads of Zika-infected children. On that note, how was anyone supposed to notice what those cowboy hats were always covering?
Further research is being conducted to find an effective treatment for this frighteningly virulent disease. In the meantime, America’s proud southerners have managed to laugh off the incident. After all, these are the same people who passed a law to put tail lights on their horses after midnight.