From Flu Wiki 2

Forum: Did We Dodge a Bullet or is This the Calm Before the Storm

09 June 2006

City Slicker – at 21:27

With the confirmation of H2H2H in Indonesia last month, and the news that 50+ residents of the village were under quarantine watch, then speculation of a nurse getting the virus…. not to mention news of Indonesians taking refuge in contaminated chicken barns after the earthquake, then the news of Tamiflu maybe being sent to the area by the US Government - I thought for sure the pandemic was upon us. Now it seems like “poof”, the threat disappeared. Is this the type of emotional roller coaster we should come to expect?

I am not scientific enough to understand where the virus goes during this apparent “lapse”, and how it might suddenly resurface again somewhere else in Indonesia! Does anyone have any explanation (in layman terms) what might be going on and what we might expect next?

Janet – at 21:33

City Slicker: Just wrote about this on another thread. Am halfway through the book, The Great Influenza.

The author talks about how a much lighter version of the virus circulated for some time and then just disappeared. Alot of people had gotten sick, with a small amount of deaths, and the officials were reporting that everything was over and done with.

Here the virus went dormant. The author suggested that it went dormant in order to gather what it needed to become more virolent. I layed dormant for months and then came raging back into a full blown pandemic.

I am not sure anyone knows why this happened, but it appears that this is something that a virus will do.

Does anyone know why? Is it simply that the virus is a lot smarter than anyone gives it credit for and is “reassorting” until it can come back stronger and prey off of more hosts?

LMWatbullrunat 21:42

virii do not care. THey simply adapt to the available hosts and environment. The fact that infections dropped off in the summer of 1918 may have more to do with changes in the weather than anything else. The sudden resurgence in September might mean that blind evolution and weather changes again coincided.

Much is different now than then. We move continent to continent in hours, not days. There are 4 times as many hosts now. The host population is much more concentrated now. People are far more dependent on civilized infrastructrure for survival.

Then, too, much is sadly the same. Our response is fragmented, our officials are corrupt or uncaring, and the best advice of the best trained, most experienced physicians is not being heeded. Preventative measures that might have been taken were ignored.

Jumping Jack Flash – at 21:54

I often wonder if this is the earth’s natural evolutionary response to an over crowded planet. Mankind and society has industrialized more in the last 100 years than in the last 100,000. Even without a pandemic, I don’t think mankind can continue on the present track for another 100 years without self destruction.

LMWatbullrunat 22:03

JJF-

I disagree. We need to get out of our birthing basket and expand into the galaxy. Just getting into the solar system would be a good first step; I’m not talking about sending robots, I’m talking about people homesteading the asteroids.

INFOMASS – at 22:06

At least in the US, population was growing again one year after the 1918 flu, so flu is not a good means of population control for long. If we get more crowded and remain careless and/or institutionally incompetent, pandemics will happen with some frequency probably measured about once a century for really bad ones. Certainly a warmer earth with less biodiversity may increase a range of diseases, but that is more likely to degrade the quality of life than end it altogether. You can look at this through a number of perspectives, but the bottom line is that there is a “stupid tax” for individuals and societies. Fluwikie is intelligent, but the societal response thus far has not been.

cactus az – at 22:10
 I agree with that,LMW.
 Humankind is too fragile to keep to 1 planet,or 1 solar system,for that matter..
 But, I don`t see it happening any time soon.
 By now we should have colonies on the moon and Mars.
 Another part of me agrees with Jack. Gaia is perhaps getting tired of us messing up her world, and is perhaps getting ready to do some serious Spring cleaning.
City Slicker – at 22:13

Don’t hijack my thread with all this talk about too many humans on the planet… get your own thread. My question is about what is going on in Indonesia right now.

inthehills – at 22:13

people spreading thru the cosmos like,well,a virus.

Janet – at 22:13

It is Mother Nature - plain and simple. I don’t think disasters such as hurricanes, volcanoes, earthquakes, pandemics happen because we are doing something wrong. I think it is cyclical and Mother Nature. It is the way it always has been and probably the way it always will be unless mankind gets smart enough to ward them off or comes up with a powerful warning system.

I just don’t choose to think that these are things that we can control or have to deal with for some evil that we have done. It happens across the different species throughout history. Survival of the fittest is the reason we come through the other end.

FW – at 22:30

City Slicker – at 22:13 wrote:

>Don’t hijack my thread with all this talk about too many humans on the planet… get your own thread. My question is about what is going on in Indonesia right now.<

War, famine, pestilence, and death. The local media is overwhelmed with troubles to report, and also subject to the power of the state. The international media is losing interest because Bird Flu hasn’t gone pandemic, the volcano hasn’t gone off, and earthquakes and the devastation they cause are old hat. One should not mistake a lack of reporting of disaster, for a lack of disaster itself.

lbb – at 22:47

Don’t hijack my thread with all this talk about too many humans on the planet… get your own thread. My question is about what is going on in Indonesia right now.

Actually, what you asked was:

Did We Dodge a Bullet or is This the Calm Before the Storm

…and my reaction was, that’s a false dichotomy. There are other possibilities. Perhaps one day we’ll know if this was “dodging a bullet” — a near miss of a lethal possibility — or if the bullet is still coming…or if there isn’t any damn bullet, or if the bullet looks very different from what all the fluwikians think it will.

If your only tool is a hammer, you’re going to see every problem as a nail…and if you get too caught up in the inevitability of a flu pandemic, you’ll get hit by a city bus some day as you step off the curb, your vision impaired by a four-foot-high crate of toilet paper.

Rayne – at 23:09

Janet, I disagree with you to a certain extent. We can’t fight hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes and the like (though we can be prepared for them), but we can do a lot to decrease the spread of a virus. Countries could set strict standards that farmers and others should have to live by. Many diseases come into play due to unsanitary conditions. IMO, the BF is one result of these conditions.

Unfortunately for all of us, 3rd world countries have little choice in the way they operate.

10 June 2006

Hurricane Alley RN – at 00:18

The calm before the storm.

  While everyone is busy watchinf Indonesia, don’t you think you should be watching what is going on in other parts of the world? Why has China gotten so quiet? Does the Chinese government care if they lose a few million people? I think you know the answer to that question. Do they care if they spread the virus? These are questions everyone needs to ask themselves. Stop looking at the little picture (Indonesia) and look at the big picture. Is this virus as dorment as we think? For those who have not started prepping, here is a little advice. Start! Do you think this virus is going to wait around for you to decide?  Big brother is going to take care of himself first. Thank God we have the Wikie. gina
Cygnet – at 00:50

I think we simply don’t, and can’t, know if we dodged the bullet or if there’s a looming pandemic. We don’t have enough information to know if the issue in Indonesia was a “near miss” or if the pandemic’s slowly starting and is going to catch us by surprise. We don’t have enough info yet to solve for X and figure out the equation.

And Huricane Alley RN is right — we don’t know what’s going on in the rest of the world. China is a concern. Various parts of Africa where the health situation is so bad that they likely wouldn’t even NOTICE the start of a pandemic, what with people dying of everything else already. (Is it bird flu or regular flu? If you’re half starved, either will kill you.)

North Korea — God only knows.

lauraB – at 07:14

We’d have to wait for a very long time, years in fact, to know if we “dodged.” Personally I think the storm is still brewing over parts of Asia, Africa and elsewhere.

Mr White42 – at 07:45

Cygnet – at 00:50 “We don’t have enough info yet to solve for X and figure out the equation.” Good question Cyg.

X = Guangdong Province.

lbb – at 08:05

So where’d you get that crystal ball, Mr White42? Did God speak to you and whisper, “Heyyyyy…it’s Guangdong Province! That’s where it’s happening!”

Asking whether we dodged a bullet or this is the calm before the storm, or if there even is a storm, verges on mental masturbation at this point. These are determinations made with hindsight, if ever. Asserting that one has certain knowledge of the future is worse still.

NW – at 08:40

“Is this the type of emotional roller coaster we should come to expect?”

It is an emotional “roller coaster” only if you react to it. Keep a wary eye on it and prep if it makes you fell better but live your life as if there will be a tomorrow. Life is a crap shoot as it is. One on my daughter’d friend’s dad died this week. He was in his 30′s. I’m going to visit a friend today - in his mid 80′s. We live we die. Make the most of each day. Love your family and your dog … and quit frettin.

Cygnet – at 09:56

Re: life’s a crap shoot —

There was a family of four in my community that was leaving the grocery store when they got hit by a gravel truck last weekend. Both vehicles caught fire and the whole family was gone in an instant.

You just don’t know. Could be bird flu, could be a lightning strike.

I rather enjoy life, so I prep for things like bird flu. But you know — it’s also important simply to enjoy life, and live life to its fullest, and make your dreams happen today, because tomorrow doesn’t always come.

Oremus – at 10:28

IMO, Dodge=20% Calm=80%

European – at 11:23

We did not dodge a bullet this time. To continue the analogy; The gun is about to be loaded, but some bullets are still duds. The proper technology is still not good enough; the virus is not yet adapted to enable easy transmission between humans. But it keeps adapting and one of these days nature will come up with the perfect combination to make a fully H2H transmittable virus, or the gun will be full loaded with real live and functional ammunition. The ammunition can be is not only a lump of lead. It can probably be likened to a smart missile. When it is let of ot will hit, doesn’t matter how much we dodge.

Medical Maven – at 11:50

European: Regarding the “smart missiles” that are no doubt on the way (or in the process of being created)--- one of my favorite quotes from Montaigne:

“Impatient with his fortune he (Man) has used all his wits to rebuild himself and prop himself up with his inventions”.

FORTUNE is staring us in the face. Where are our WITS?

anon_22 – at 11:58

City Slicker,

That was a really good question to ask. The discussion on the Final Adaptation of H5N1 thread proposes a mechanism for explanation. Bottom line, if there is a mammalian reservoir, then we could have a sudden explosive onset. If not, we may continue to see this smoldering on again off again progression.

I also happen to think Guangdong province is important to watch, cos that is the place where H5N1 is continuing to brew up new strains by reassortment, whereas the strains in most other places have remained ‘relatively’ stable. That is, small progressive mutations (in the absence of the mammalian reservoir scenario) are happening all over the world, but Guangdong is where sudden big changes are most likely to happen.

LMWatBullRunat 12:18

To continue the analogy used in the title-

Imagine you live in Oklahoma. It’s August, very hot, very humid. The barometer is dropping, the sky is turning grey, we hear faint rumbling way off in the distance. The NWS has issued a severe thunderstorm watch, but your buddy 30 miles away called you to tell you that he saw a funnel cloud forming.

Are we going to get hit with a tornado today? How bad will it be? Nobody knows for sure. But the prudent person has a storm shelter ready for his family because he KNOWS he may need it sooner or later.

Yowza – at 12:27

“I disagree. We need to get out of our birthing basket and expand into the galaxy. Just getting into the solar system would be a good first step; I’m not talking about sending robots, I’m talking about people homesteading the asteroids.”

Yee Haa! Count me in!!

anon_22 – at 12:29

Please lets stay on topic. Thank you.

Janet – at 12:30

Rayne: I think we agree that can mitigate damages of Mother Nature (try and stop the spread of a virus, build levees to stop the devastation of a Category 5 hurricane, etc). However, you CANNOT stop Mother Nature - not as of yet at least.

YOu can’t stop a hurricane, you can’t stop a volcano, you can’t stop an earthquake and it does not look like we can stop a pandemic - pray that we can ease the pain and reduce death and illness by taking measures. But stopping it….don’t think so.

Lily – at 12:46

Every now and again I feel I’ve absorbed enough data, and am simply going to enjoy life as I always have, with just that little edge of this might happen to spur me into a bit more prep. We have no control over what happens, except to prepare mentally and materially. If it happens I’m not going to be that suprised, yet something in me says there is time. Enjoy life and all its beauty and joys. Its all there now, it may not be there afterwards, in quite the same way. I don’t envy the oblivious. I’m glad I’m aware, but I refuse to think it really has arrived. Temperment is all with me, and life has taught me very little beyond what I came into the world with, and that is optimism and a gift to be truly happy in my own skin. I’ve watched people fret and worry endlessly over the most minor of troubles, blowing them out of proportiion. This isn’t blown out of proportion, it is very possible. But I live very happily swaddled in my optimism. I’ll get up every day to a glorious world, and when and if it turns h2h I’ll accept it, because none of us has a choice in this. I will print up the data, and mull it over tonight. But I know I won’t feel any different tomorrow morning.

Albert – at 13:03

Did we dodge the bullet ? Nobody can answer that. It has been “quiet” since the Indonesia clusters. If H2H would start somewhere, anywhere, with more than a few dozen cases, I think we will hear of it quite soon. Even if it happens in a remote place.

So our prepping has slowed down. We have a couple of racks with stuff and some stashes of drinking water and what have you. Nothing near what is necessary to SIP. I guess if we have to lock the door right now, vital ingredients will be short in a week, maybe two. But we stay alert and check the news every day. If TSHTF, we will have done some shlepping in advance :) We are six people in my household. The arithmetic to prepare for six months SIP are mind-boggling: 6 x 3 x 31 x 6 = 3,348 meals !

Grace RN – at 15:12

I think this is a great topic: wish I knew the answer. Will it be a repeat of the summer of 1918/fall/winter of 1918?

I do not know; but this much I do know, more from gut reaction than scientific knowledge. The risk is very present now, the ingredients are almost fully mixed (people, host mammals/birds and a nasty virus) so the need is to be ready, no matter how fatiquing and nerve-wracking.

And boy, is it ever nerve-wracking!!!!

Commonground – at 15:35

For me, this is the “calm before the storm”. Especially after I just read this from the “H5N1 Receptor Binding Domain Discrepency” thread, June 10th, Andrew Jeremijenko - 02:47:

And I quote:

F. Their surveillance is limited. There are 2000 deaths a day from pneumonia and 300 deaths a day from TB. Most of these deaths are in people who have been exposed to chickens. With the virus endemic in Indonesia basically all of these should be suspect cases. Very few are tested, I don’t think we have ever tested more then 10 suspect H5N1 cases a day. There are a number of family clusters I am aware of that have never been tested or where only one person was tested. Only limited testing in large cities like Surabaya, Medan, Bandung and Jakarta occurs. We know we are missing cases especially in rural areas. We don’t know how many.

Lily – at 15:45

I read the above and felt differently. They have islands that are isolated, they could do something. I thought he seemed hopeful that if they could be pressured they could stop it, and be free of it.

anon_22 – at 15:52

If you take a look at the ‘cumulative cases’ chart here, you will see that last year the trend sort of started to slow down around this time. So this may be seasonal variation only.

If you compare the slopes of Jan - April/May 05 and 06 there is just the tiniest bit of increase in gradient. Not much, and certainly not enough case numbers for us to think of it as a trend, but still sobering.

Have fun staring at the chart!

Hurricane Alley RN – at 16:01

Grace RN @ 15:12.

Right there with you. Trust your gut. I keep remembering the days when that was all mankind had and it wasn’t that long ago. At least we have a chance to prep this time diaspite the TPTB.

Talk about nerve-wracking. I think I’m down to my last one. It looks a little frazzled. Self diagnosis. It’s time for a mental health check. A walk along the beach seems to be the perfect Rx. I invite you and anyone else to join me. We need to do this quickly because there is a storm brewing. Or should I say two. I think it can be accuritly stated, “Mother Nature is P.O.” Gina

Jane – at 16:04

About a mammalian reservoir, in the village in Sumatra where 5 of 6 (or 6 of 7) family members died, pigs have tested positive, acc. to a story in RSOE hazards on May 18. http://www.tinyurl.com/pfrvs

If there has been discussion of this, I missed it. All I remember is that the mother in the family was assumed to have gotten it from chickens sold near her vegetable stall. And they had a pig roast, didn’t they?

11 June 2006

Quartzman – at 09:43

anon_22 – at 15:52

Yes - and anyone who wants to search the online archives on the China newspaper site can go back and see that Vietnam declared themselves clear right about now in 2004… but new cases began popping up again just a month or two later.

I think it was neither a dodged bullit or the calm before the storm…

The storm is gathering, hits us with wavas and this is simply one “down time” between waves.

What we should be concerned about is that the waves appear, to me, to be becoming more organized. A very subjective observation - but you asked for opinions.

>8)

Mr White42 – at 11:13

Origin, onset, vectors, migration(fowl and human), sequences, unreported cases, unknown cases, cover-up cases, recovered cases, reassortment, mutation, recombination, virii blending, trade, tourism, governmental help and hinder, general ethical treatment,preparation, new outbreaks…

If a bullet has been dodged-it is the supposition that there was only one.

Calm. Have not seen this. Storm. Always more than one.

Mr White42 – at 11:15

BTW, the title of this thread, if I may say so, is generally a rhetoical question. MW42

Melanie – at 11:28

The title of this thread is actually a logical fallacy known as a false dichotomy.

Mr White42 – at 11:53

or false dilemma, in this case.

Cisne – at 12:38

City Slicker a 22:13:

There is a parallel here between 1918 and the current situation in Indonesia. In 1918, the Pandemic was helped along by mass movement of men into Army training camps here in the U.S. The men were packed into barracks that were too small for their numbers. It was the perfect environment in which flu could procreate, evolve and infect.

Currently, in Indonesia, we have mass movements of people into small areas as they evacuate villages near the active volcano. We also have those who fled the damage from the Earthquake. Too many people too close together.

I think the virus is smoldering. Not a lot of smoke just yet - but given the right fuel and the right conditions, the firestorm will explode. I think it’s the lull.

Grace RN – at 12:46

Hurricane Alley RN – at 16:01 Gina-what I woulnd’t give to be able to walk with you on the beach and talk about this. I know you know how vital the “gut” trusting is-that you have made critical, live-saving interventions that began with only a “gut feeling”.

I agree-the black clouds are out there, we hear the thunder…will it dissapate? Will it continue to organize? Can only stay well, watch wait, prepare, and help others prepare, and react when needed. Backbone of nursing!

Life itself is the nursing process!

17 July 2006

anonymous – at 05:02

<spam deleted>

Ocean2 – at 05:44

Again spam!!!

Spam Alert – at 05:45
Cloud9 – at 08:33

Nope, nobody gets out of this thing alive.

glennk – at 21:53

Come on Coud 9 this isn’t the end of the world. I think we have to stop acting as if it is. In 1918 the flu killed millions and a few yrs. after the world’s population had doubled. THis will be bad but we have 6. 5 billion now and even bad isn’t going to kill us off. We’d need a nuclear war or an asteriod hit sor super volcanoic eruption to do us all in. H5n1 is none of the above.

Olymom – at 22:24

One of the things that really hurt the US these last few years is that our leaders looked at Iraq through Western eyes. There was not near enough awareness of religious, tribal and village groupings or an understanding of what the infrastructure was (or wasn’t). We’re doing the same here much of the time on fluwiki. Indonesia is comprised of something like 5000 islands — the islands are spread over hundreds of miles, sometimes with huge currents moving between one island and the next — people are born, live and die without ever seeing a government official. There are all sorts of diseases and paracites in the tropics that westerners don’t think about (because we never have them). “She had a fever and died” could be a LOT of things.

I’ve never been to China — but it’s not islands and the government is keen to be in control — and it sounds like more of the population is literate and/or has access to TV or radio.

I don’t think we’ve dodged a bullet yet. I think we need more eyes and ears on the ground in Indonesia and Africa. Maybe this will be like Ebola, which is horrible, but never has attained “lift off” to be wide spread — gee, I hope so.

18 July 2006

noni – at 04:40

Most of the population in China is literate, Olymom, you are correct. Not quite like US or Australia or Europe or Canada, but pretty good. Happened to be researching adult literacy online last nite and noted that. glennK-sometimes you speak in absolutes also.

Cloud9 – at 07:54

Nope, taking the long view, nobody gets out of this life experience alive. Most of us came into this world naked and screaming. Many will leave the same way. This bug is just one of a long list of things that threatens us. My point is that our individual ends are certainties, so why dwell on it. How we conduct ourselves in our brief moment in the sun is what matters.

19 July 2006

Watching and Learning – at 03:29

Way too early to be talking about dodging a bird flu bullet!!

This is a question for many seasons from now if we haven’t had a serious efficient outbreak. Sheesh! We haven’t even gotten through the flu season yet. Keep prepping!

Melanie – at 04:28

And watching and learning

Ruth – at 08:40

If bird flu does not occur over the course of this fall/winter/and spring, I may become relaxed a bit. But I’m really concerned about the upcoming winter. It has spread to many more countries over the last year which is not a good sign.

LMWatBullRunat 20:52

It is possible that H5N1 will make the jump this winter and we’ll see a pandemic. It is also possible that we won’t. This winter. Eventually, however, we will see a pandemic. So the answer to the thread question is that there will be no dodging.

I also think that the optimism that H. Sap. will survive is unsupported. I do think that in order of decreasing probability as a result of a pandemic are the following events-

Collapse of the US; Collapse of civilization; Extinction of H. Sap.

20 July 2006

Quartzman – at 07:29

Cloud9 – at 07:54

“Nope, taking the long view, nobody gets out of this life experience alive.”

lol - I know what you meant but really to use more common words your sentence goes, “No one dies without dying.”

LMWatBullRun – at 20:52

“Collapse of the US; Collapse of civilization; Extinction of H. Sap.”

That statement comes off a bit Ameri-Centric doesn’t it? I mean, huge civilizations with a much much much longer track record than the US have come and gone without the “Collapse of civilization”.

Don’t get me wrong - I’m love our country - flawed as it may be - it has potential to do great things. However, I’d never suggest its demise would lead to teh demise of the human race. Could a combination of events dwindle our numbers? Yes. Could modern conviences vanish - sure - it’s possible.

But being the intelligent creatures we are, it’ll be difficult to wipe us out entirely without wiping out most life on this planet.

So barring a killer asteroid… it’ll be us, the roaches, flu virus, and MTV. :)

Ruth – at 08:13

Civilization will not collapse. People will get sick, people will die, most will live. Life may get tough for a while, things may change, but we will survive. I also don’t think this pandemic will be a worst case situation. Don’t get me wrong, I am prepping and watching the news daily, but I doubt that we will all be isolating for months on end. (Some may, but most won’t)

LMWatBullRunat 10:18

perhaps I did not explain that very well, but what I meant was that collapse of the US economically is more likely than the total collapse of world civilization, and that still less likely is the extinction of homo sapiens sapiens. I do not think any of these are impossible.

I think a serious pandemic, 30% CIR and 10% CFR would probably cause an economic collapse of the US. What that would do to the rest of the world is open to conjecture, but since I live in the US, I’m not going to worry about that too much.

I think a severe pandemic with 50% CIR and 75% CFR will be a civilization ending event, albeit not an extinction level event. By itself. But there is no reason that we as a species could not be driven to the point of non-viability by such an epidemic.

I do think that given the time that we have been around as a species, (Several tens of thousands of years) and given the time it takes to build us up to where we are now (say 5 or 6 thousand years) it is curious that we seem to be the first civilization that humans have evolved. Is it possible that civilization has been developed and then ended before? What traces of a 25,000 year old civilization would be left? Flu has certainly been around long enough…….

On the fence – at 11:16

The basic drive of most people is to build assets, establish a power base, and make babies. Even if a big chunk of people die from this, those remaining will do their very, very best to build up. It may not look like our massive economy we have today but it won’t be caveman time either. The VERY worst I can imagine would be a brief revisit to the lifestyle of the late 1800′s, early 1900′s before a big jump to where we are now- if not better. I agree with Ruth at 8:13. No collapse.

LMWatBullRunat 13:33

The problem, OTF, is that the lack of an industrial economy will cause a collapse to subsistence level, as we do not retain the technological base to support a late 19th century economy. There are not enough people who know how to run such an economy.

Commonground – at 14:04

Albert at 13:03-June 10th: “ We are six people in my household. The arithmetic to prepare for six months SIP are mind-boggling: 6 x 3 x 31 x 6 = 3,348 meals !”

My Aunt passed away a year ago. I used to love to hear her tell me about her childhood. My Grandmother had 14 children. 11 survived. 2 passed away from the Spanish Flu, a 5 and a 6 year old. One of the things I remember her telling me not long before she died, was back then, they didn’t eat like we do now. It was one main meal a day. And it wasn’t a meat, starch and vegetable. My Uncles used to walk the railroad tracks to gather coal that had fallen from the cars. Enough to keep them warm. I learned a lot from her. When surviving becomes the top priority, our preps can be stretched.

Janet – at 14:09

Ruth: I think that most financial experts (those who really seem to be following the pandemic and have their finger on the pulse of what is happening and what it could mean) agree with you that this will be a short-lived affect with a mean one-two punch.

It will hit everyone at one time and should be over and done with in a relatively short period of time. I know there are many who would argue for total collapse. I, for one, have no idea. However, most economists that I have some relative amount of faith in and seem to know their trade feel it will have a short-term hit that will result in a steady growth and rebuild afterwards. That won’t help those who die in the pandemic or their family members, but should be some comfort to those of us who plan on SIP and waiting it out.

Historians will tell you that the pandemic of 1918 had a very short lived impact on the economy, though there was a tremendous amount of human lives lost. I know that we did not have the Internet then and that everything was dependant on it. However, everyone’s prediciton of total collapse is based on people not being able to work. People will be unable to work for a relatively short period of time. Once the pandemic is over, people will be literally flooding back to work in order to recoup some of their financial losses and to get things back to some semblance of normalcy. Yes, there will be very difficult times. Digging out of debt and paying off arrears, etc., will be extremely difficult. But, again, when the disease passes people will return to jobs (maybe not the one they had) and things will go on.

Cloud9 – at 14:18

Worst case, we lose 70% of the population here in the USA. That is a horrible event but, doesn’t that leave somewhere around 80 million people still alive? Assuming that infection will be random, a fair amount of the brilliant and not so brilliant should survive. Resident in that surviving population should be a fair amount of know how.

Janet – at 15:13

Those percentages would indeed be horrific. Can’t even imagine it. But you are right when you say that there will be many, many people left and life will resume. That is the nature of nature. Things grow back after hurricanes and tornados and floods and earthquakes and asteroids and any other horrible scenario that can be thrown at us. Even in areas where one would think life has been destroyed.

Let’s all hope and pray that the worst case is nowhere near 70%. Actually, let’s all hope and pray it never occurs.

glennk – at 21:07

70% death rate for the entire population? Could 9 where is there any historical precedent for such a death rate? Even in the black plague only 30% of Europe died and that was with absolutely no medical establishment at all. In 1918 the CFR of those that got the flu was maybe 20% and that’s probably to the high side although nobody knows for sure.

Medical Maven – at 21:28

glennk at 21:07: Collateral damage will be much worse this time with a similar CFR as the Black Plague. The serfs that were left only had to pick up the rusting tools lying about, find some seed stores, bag some (now plentiful) game, and start up again.

I consistently detect an extreme aversion on your part to even consider as possible the worst outcome. I don’t expect the worst. I expect something like 1918 or slightly or moderately worse than that. But I do contemplate the other, because IT IS Possible. You can not show me the studies that dispute that (or conversely) prove that. But pure logic applied will lead you right there where you refuse to go, (for some reason).

glennk – at 22:30

Medical nobody knows for sure if this thing will even go pandemic let alone do all the killing many think it will. All any of us can to is make guesses. Yes, I have an aversion to thinking this will be the greatest plague in human history because the odds are against it. If it’s as bad as 1918 that will still be horrific and something to be ready for. Anything beyond is mind boggling and really difficult to imagine.

Anon_451 – at 22:50

glennk – at 22:30

“Anything beyond is mind boggling and really difficult to imagine.”

You and every politican out there. They refuse to acknowledge that it COULD happen therefore it will not happen.

21 July 2006

Janet – at 08:57

No one knows for sure but I certainly appreciate Glennk’s right to think more positively. I think it is very difficult for most of us to think or get our minds around the other extreme of 70% death rate. Preparing for somewhere in the middle is most likely what most of us on FW are capable of doing.

I am hoping that the antivirals and antibiotics (and other meds) that we have today will assist in keeping the numbers lower. However, this may prove not to be the case. I am also hopeful that a vaccine will be discovered that will at least reduce the number of deaths. We know that it will take up to a year for a vaccine that will eliminate or prevent the flu, but there certainly seems to be some hope for an intermediate vaccine that may prevent death.

Some of us need to hold on to hope (even if false hope) in order to mentally absorb this threat.

Ruth – at 10:48

I agree. To think we would loose 70% of the population is like there is no hope. I think pyschologically, we need to think in terms of 5–10% loss in order to mentally prepare for the possiblility of this pandemic. Otherwise, we would freeze with fear. (Lots of people are doing that now, so overwhelming that they don’t prep.) I can’t think in such large #’s. Besides, I don’t think it will be that high anyway. So I’m prepping as if most of us will survive. It couldn’t be worse that 1918 could it?

Cloud9 – at 10:49

Glennk: My point was not that 70% would die in a pandemic. My point was that even with that high of a mortality rate, millions will still be alive to carry on civilization. Even if only 1% of the population survived, there would still be millions of people left in the world.

There is a discussion that some catastrophe in the past reduced the world population to a few thousand. http://www.davidpbrown.co.uk/nota-bene/dna.html If we can spring back from a few thousand, I have no doubt that civilization will continue with millions of survivors.

LMWatBullRunat 11:24

As I have stated on another thread there is a HUGE difference between what I think WILL happen, and what I think COULD happen. The worst possible case for the flu is far different from my expected case.

That said, I think many may overestimate the resilience of civilization as presently constituted. In 1918, most lived in rural society (70%) today over 90% live in large cities. If the cities break down, no power no food no water, then we’ll lose that 90% from exposure, other disease and starvation. Most of the technology and knowledge required to keep modern civilization running is in the cities. At some point, it ceases to be a flu issue, and becomes an economic issue.

See S.M. Stirling’s “Dies the Fire” for a fictional account of how a loss of electrical power affects civilization. As much as I enjoyed Lucifers Hammer, this is more realistic.

18 September 2006

Closed - Bronco Bill – at 00:12

Closed to maintain Forum speed.

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