Sitala, the Goddess of Measles

In my novel, The Sum of Our Gods, I chose a variety of gods and goddesses from various cultures and tossed them all together to see what would happen. One of the goddesses I did not know about (and therefore couldn't include) was Sitala, the Hindu goddess "of sores, ghouls, pustules and diseases." (Thanks, Wikipedia!) Besides comforting children afflicted with fevers by giving them coolness (like punk-rock hairdos and leather jackets, I guess?), she also afflicted her enemies with the measles. That seems counter-productive to me since the measles, among other things, cause fevers which she would have to take care of with her leather jacket distribution racket. But the gods are all kind-of silly in their own ways. That's the whole point of the book. Anyway, as I wrote the novel, I thought a lot about what my characters looked like. I suspect many writers fall into the trap of casting our novels as though they were big budget Hollywood movies, even when we know they won't be. (If you are a Hollywood producer and would like to option The Sum of Our Gods, it's still available.) I didn't have any image in mind for Sitala because, as I mentioned, I didn't know about her and she isn't in the book.

But now that I do know there's a goddess who gives out the measles, I want to make this clear: The goddess of sores, pustules, and disease looks like this:

Here she is giving the measles (or some other entirely preventable disease) to some innocent little girl (who I refuse to recognize):

Sitala is terrifying. The diseases she spreads are tragic. She is afraid of vaccines, though. And science in general. Protect yourself and your children from this creature!