Originally posted by Agit8dChop
7 people got sick with the flu? This isnt NEWS. 20horses died the other day from something unknown, that barely made a headline.
So I have to ask ,why is 7 people sick, but recovered making headlines in the US and in Australia?
www.news.com.au...
SEVEN people have been diagnosed with a strange and unusual new kind of swine flu in California and Texas, the US Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention reported.
All seven people have recovered but the virus itself is a never-before-seen mixture of viruses typical among pigs, birds and humans, the CDC said.
This is on the front page of www.news.com.au
I cant believe its on Australian front page news.
Why are they pre-empting things like this:
"We don't think this is time for major concern around the country."
However, some experts fear this strain, or another strain, could spark a pandemic that could kill millions.
"We believe at this point that human-to-human spread is occurring," Dr Schuchat said.
"That's unusual. We don't know yet how widely it is spreading.
"We are also working with international partners to understand what is occurring in other parts of the world."
Other parts of the world?
7 people had the flu, and got better... why are we saying this is a worldy event?
something stinks..
This is not a case in which something stinks, it is just the nature evolution of a virus. It is also nothing to be scared of, if you are prepared. I
know in South Australia our health department is very well advanced in planning for an occurrence of a pandemic. I know as i am one of the
infrastructure engineer with the department and we do annual exercises to practice keeping things going if our team is isolated in different places,
such as homes and individual data centres etc.
At my house I have three large storage containers with canned and dehydrated provisions, batteries, torches and a battery operated radio. I have
enough to last for several weeks, the only thing we lack is water, so will be relying on the mains supply. We also have face masks just in case we
need to go into public. If a pandemic hits my family will be staying at home, we will not have physical contact with the outside world. Hopefully we
never have to activate our family plan but being prepared never hurts.
From the workshops I have done I would recommended having a mobile phone handy. The first services to be cut to the ordinary joe citizen will be
publicly switched phone network (PSPN) (to reserve communications to essential services), but it has to be noted that the first services to be turned
off will be the mobile network as telcos have a higher level SLA around PSPN.
Any pandemic will come in waves, with each wave lasting about 4- 6 weeks and waves spread over a series of months. So remember to restock. If a
pandemic does hit personal hygie is important, as the articles already posted states don't shake hands, kiss anyone who has no contact with your
isolation group, wash hands all the comment sense stuff. Viruses can last hours (about 12) on surfaces after someone sneezes, but only a few hours on
someone hands.
Play it safe, get prepared and everyone will be ok. If all of the community is prepared any pandemic will be short lived.