Please form an orderly queue for your good-grammar vaccination

MC Grammar recently received a series of vaccinations, and now feels ready to take on the world. Rabies, Hepatitis A and B can't hurt me, neither can Malaria, Diphtheria, Typhoid or Yellow Fever. It's a good feeling. Sorry all you anti-immunisation lobbyists, I'm immunised up to my eyeballs and I love it.

Some fun times were had over the last few weeks, as I regularly rocked up to my local surgery and chatted cheerfully away to my nurse, as she cleverly lulled my muscles into relaxed state, before jabbing a total of 9 needles into me. But an interesting point was raised during the many afternoons I spent there: are you immune to, or immune from, a disease?

Before we go further, this might be a good moment to brush up on our understanding of prepositions. A preposition is a 'linking' word, such as to, from, over, or during. What they link is nouns, phrases or pronouns to the sentence. They're like the MC that introduce the main act. For example,

The book is beside the table.

That said, what's the story with being immune to, or immune from? Well brothers and sisters, it's a complicated story, because it depends what you're talking about. If you are talking about being protected from an 'undesirable circumstance' such as getting criminally prosecuted, or heavily taxed, then you are immune from. For example, you can be 'immune from arrest', or 'immune from criticism.'

However, when you're talking about something you're not susceptible or responsive to, you use immune to. For example 'I am immune to Polio.'

This is a tricky mother. The Oxford English Dictionary gives lots of examples of 'immune to' and 'immune from' that don't follow the pattern above. Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary uses the 'immune to' phrasing to include anything a person might be resistant to, for example, 'he was immune to all pleas.' It's one of those things that if you think about it too hard, you can fry your brain and alienate yourself from your loved ones.

MC Grammar thinks that if you just surf the preposition wave, this one sort of sorts itself out. When you think about it, it makes sense that you're immune 'from' something that you're trying to get away from, or would rather not happen, and you're immune 'to' something that you have personally arranged will never happen. Take MC Grammar and Rabies, for example, I will never meet my end by frothing at the mouth – I've seen to that.