Many published news sources said that the prolific veteran comic book artist and cartoonist Al Plastino died from Prostate Cancer so that is what got reported on Wikipedia. I have been in touch today with Mr. Plastino's daughter, MaryAnn Plastino Charles, and she says that's not so. She writes…
…some of the news stories were incorrect about my father's death. He did not die from Prostate Cancer. He was in good health up until receiving a flu shot and developed Guillan Barre Syndrome which paralyzed and killed him very quickly. Please edit out the Prostate Cancer.
I don't know how to correct Wikipedia. Based on a discussion we had on Facebook, someone who does (thank you, that someone) went there and changed the wording but later today, another someone reworded it further so now it's not right.
I assume the problem is that while anyone can change what it says on a Wikipedia page, the administrators often overrule those changes if they do not come with sourcing that meets their strict rules. I had a small problem with them a few years ago when I answered an e-mail from someone who had questions about The Garfield Show. He tried to change incorrect info on its Wikipedia page and administrators told him that an e-mail — even an e-mail from the Supervising Producer and Show Runner of the program — did not meet their criteria because, I guess, this e-mail was not available for public inspection or no one could prove it came from me or something.
I then posted the same information on this blog and they accepted that as a good source and the changes were made. So here I am posting the message from Ms. Charles on that same blog. It's his daughter, people. You can't get a better source than that and I, of course, am utterly trustworthy in my reporting. So could someone go change Wikipedia so it reflects the true cause of death and link to this item for verification? Al's daughter says he wanted people to know what happened to him so maybe it would prevent the same thing from happening to someone else. A worthy goal.