Articles Archives
Pandemic of Planning
March 5, 2008
Commentary, The Daily News,
Most adults in America have probably suffered from a bout with the
flu. They didn't like it, but they dealt with it and were soon back
to life as normal. So it's not surprising that even as health officials
are confessing that they missed the mark with this year's flu shots,
there's no widespread panic. Concern, maybe, but not panic. If they
get the flu, people figure they'll deal with it. It's the American way.
But what if the unthinkable were to happen and the flu mutated into
a particularly potent strain that struck hard and wide, becoming not
just an epidemic but a pandemic, akin to the 1918 influenza outbreak
described in Thomas Mullen's novel The Last Town on Earth? Local health
and emergency management officials say the idea's not all that farfetched.
They've thought about the possibility and tried to plan some response
- what Orleans County Emergency Management Director Paul Wagner calls
a ''mass fatality plan.''
Sue Conklin, the Genesee County historian speaking at Richmond Memorial
Library last week, described similar response plans, noting that in
such an emergency government employees would be called into service
to keep things functioning. Things like ... water service, for example.
The municipal water you turn on without thinking might not be there
if the people who run the water treatment facilities are all sick. If
all the highway department employees are sick, who will plow or salt
the roads on a day like today? Who will keep the gas stations open?
Who will open the grocery stores? Who will drive the trucks that supply
the stores?
Mrs. Conklin warned that it's not a question of ''if'' such a pandemic
happens, but ''when.'' Mr. Wagner figures he is ''probably the most
paranoid person in Orleans County because I'm thinking about all of
this stuff and trying to come up with a plan.''
Because most of us don't have a plan that goes beyond a few days. We
have our stash of candles and batteries, water and canned goods, but
don't figure on anything that would disrupt life for more than a few
days.
In the 1918 flu, however, life was disrupted for weeks at a time, according
to newspaper clips shown by Mrs. Conklin. Imagine schools being out
for seven weeks. Imagine your work place being ordered to shut down
for a month. Do you still get paid? For how long? And what do you do
if you aren't sick and you get tired of staying home? The movie theaters
and other places or entertainment have been ordered closed. Churches,
too. Even funerals have been banned, along with other public gatherings.
It wouldn't hurt to have a plan, would it? County planners can only
do so much. They can work to keep the water flowing and the roads clear,
but a lot of the responsibility for getting through a lethal outbreak
is up to individuals. No, it wouldn't hurt to have a plan at all.
Courtesy of Batavia Newspapers Corporation