Deadly Swine Flu Outbreak

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by Kitsune

I stopped taking this seriously when I was forced by my company to sit in on a DHS presentation back in '08 concerning business continuity in times of disaster. I found it a bit odd that despite giving this presentation in Florida, they didn't once talk about the obvious issue: hurricanes.

Yabut, doesn't everyone in Florida already know about hurricanes? If they started telling you about them wouldn't most Floridians start yawning?

[capnhowdy]

We used to start planning the party. Stock up on the necessities. Whiskey, beer, ice, and cocaine.

[Kitsune]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

Yabut, doesn't everyone in Florida already know about hurricanes? If they started telling you about them wouldn't most Floridians start yawning?

I think you'd be really surprised at how most people here react when a storm threatens. The stores get slammed, everything sells out, and people don't evacuate. Generators, food, and plywood are fought over like they were items people didn't know existed until the day before. People hoard gasoline, stations go dry. Bottled water, of all things, actually flies off the shelves and people panic when there isn't any. They act like they wouldn't be able to do anything other buy Dasani to prepare no matter how many times the news tells them to fill bathtubs, get water out of the hot water heater or, you know, just fill up containers with water from the tap before landfall. I've seen people resort to cartloads full of Diet Coke and Gatorade once the last of the gallon jugs of distilled water are gone.

My company still doesn't have a proper disaster recovery plan for a hurricane even though we talk about it every year, usually around June 1st. For the first couple years I worked in this department, they told me they were simply going to back up everything to tape and put them with me on a plane bound for Texas 12 hours before landfall. ...which, you know, might be difficult when the airport shuts down well before that time, not to mention that no one would be too interested in leaving their family behind during a major evacuation just to ensure that company data stayed dry. Today, we push data over the network and cross our fingers before everyone gets the hell out of town.

[capnhowdy]

If this flu goes pandemic, we'll wish all we'd had was a hurricane.

[Jill]

Ok, I'll step in and be the lone shoulder-shrugger. I think this is much ado about little. Sure, it's a new strain. Sure, it's (possibly*) taken the lives of 80-some people in Mexico. But the flu was the cause of death in 36,000 people in the U.S. last year. Eighty people is statistically meaningless. Not to mention that *they don't even know that it was the swine flu that caused the deaths of those 80 people!

More info, for a bit of perspective.

[Aliantha]

Originally Posted by Sundae Girl

It's already making headlines here.
Yawn, yawn - the NHS Trusts will have to waste time and money answering media questions, reassuring the public, drawing up plans in the event of a pandemic...

We had it with ebola, a flu pandemic, SARS, avian flu... now we go through it all again.

I was interested and concerned originally. Now I'm tired of it already. Sorry, how many have died? Less than in an hour from hunger in some parts of the world? Okay, I'll zone out for a bit then.

Originally Posted by Kitsune

B-b-b-but... what are you going to do? You can't just continue to live your life!

I stopped taking this seriously when I was forced by my company to sit in on a DHS presentation back in '08 concerning business continuity in times of disaster.

Disaster preparedness, indeed. Were we not living above limestone aquifers, I would expect them to suggest constructing a backyard bunker to live in perpetuum to protect against all threats. Wouldn't want to take any chances, would we?

I don't think you're the lone shoulder shrugger Jill

[tw]

Originally Posted by Jill

I think this is much ado about little. Sure, it's a new strain. Sure, it's (possibly*) taken the lives of 80-some people in Mexico. But the flu was the cause of death in 36,000 people in the U.S. last year.

Apparently you are reading too much fear into it. A disease that can cause a pandemic has been detected. You and everyone around you should know that - nothing more. Nobody is hyping it into fear. It is simply reported as a fact so that, should it personally affect you, you can at least recongnize it or be informed enought to act responsibily.

Would you instead prefer we all stayed ignorant and uninformed? That is, after all, what so many tried to do in 1985 with AIDs. To instead blame it all on Haitians, then on gays, then on evil people having sex. Insisting that we should not discuss it because it cannot affect us. Because it is god taking revenge on evil ones.

Nobody is even suggesting the world is threatened. Just that the disease has appeared AND that public health officials want you to know something new and potentially dangerous has arrived. Be informed; not fearful.

Meanwhile, what makes it more interesting: the viruse usually only appears among people in contact with pigs. These outbreaks occured where no pigs exist. A curious science story.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by Jill

Ok, I'll step in and be the lone shoulder-shrugger.

I'm wearing a rubber pig nose to work tomorrow.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Jill

Ok, I'll step in and be the lone shoulder-shrugger. I think this is much ado about little. Sure, it's a new strain. Sure, it's (possibly*) taken the lives of 80-some people in Mexico. But the flu was the cause of death in 36,000 people in the U.S. last year. Eighty people is statistically meaningless. Not to mention that *they don't even know that it was the swine flu that caused the deaths of those 80 people!

More info, for a bit of perspective.

Don't waste your breath, or typing, I have tried already. It is no one's statistic until it is your own, then it is 100%.

[classicman]

Originally Posted by capnhowdy

Napolitano called the emergency declaration standard operating procedure — one was declared recently for the inauguration and for flooding. She urged people to think of it as a "declaration of emergency preparedness."

"Really that's what we're doing right now. We're preparing in an environment where we really don't know ultimately what the size of seriousness of this outbreak is going to be."

They are scared of not acting. Seems premature to me as well, but maybe they know something we don't. :shrug:

Then again at this rate they'll be killing flies with sledgehammers soon.

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

Don't waste your breath, or typing, I have tried already. It is no one's statistic until it is your own, then it is 100%.

Jill, Merc, Ali... there are plenty of alarmists who want to just keep predicting everything will go bad, we have one here. Then when one of his ramblings comes close to being true he calls himself a genius. Never mind the dozens or hundreds (who knows how many) that were total bullshit.
I agree - this may be a very serious threat, but it is far too early to tell.
Then again, better safe than sorry...

[TheMercenary]

Look dude. My response is not one of an "alarmist" it is one of a health care provider. All I said is that we should keep an eye on it. The regular yearly flu kills enough people in this country, and as I stated it is nothing but a statistic until it is yours or someone you love.

[sugarpop]

Originally Posted by capnhowdy

We can expect a flood of illegals as a result. Some of them will be infected. May God have mercy on our souls.

yea, Janet Napolitano said today they would probably be testing people at the border, and I wondered what the hell they were going to do with all the people who crossing illegally.

[Bullitt]

Next come the zombies.. you all just wait and see.

[capnhowdy]

Originally Posted by sugarpop

yea, Janet Napolitano said today they would probably be testing people at the border, and I wondered what the hell they were going to do with all the people who crossing illegally.

My sentiments exactly.

[classicman]

Originally Posted by sugarpop

I wondered what the hell they were going to do with all the people who crossing illegally.

What makes you think they are going to do anything with them? Why would they? They are just poor souls looking to better their lives.