Surviving the Flu Pandemic

By Gary Morton at http://citizensontheweb.ca –2005
 

*Survival Note: The avian pandemic of 1918 emerged in the US months before sweeping into Canada. It hit at the beginning of October and had swept through causing thousands of deaths by early November. This indicates that if you are secluded during the month that it actually hits you likely won't get it.
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   I had a scary dream that the flu pandemic will hit and there will be deaths in every house in Toronto.
 
   I’ve also noticed an alarming trend with viruses this year in Toronto. Cold and flu-like viruses were prevalent in the August heat wave and now in the warm days of October. Some of my neighbors already have the flu or a cold even though this was the warmest summer and early fall in history. The cold going around is a bad one with a long lasting horrible cough. Legionnaires disease has already hit this year, killing a number of people and frightening many who thought their bad cold might be it.
 
   To avoid the flu you can try staying away from busy public places. Get a flu shot, buy a N-95 mask and do plenty of hand washing or hand rubbing to knock off the virus. Wear gloves and make sure you don’t touch your face with unwashed hands. The flu spreads from droplets. A coughing person can spread them into your eyes or nose and give you the flu. The virus remains alive on various surfaces. Suppose you're in a store and you use their pen to sign a credit slip or you're on the subway touching railings others have touched. In such situations you could pick up the virus and then get it when you touch your face.
 
   Hit the vitamin C and eat foods that block colds and flu such as fresh vegetables and yogurt. Drink plenty of fluids as they flush your system of toxins and strengthen immune health. Exercise, fresh air and saunas are known to work against viruses. Exercise gets blood flowing and the fresh air aids as indoor heat dries you out. Avoid smoking, excessive drinking and go for relaxation over stress. As it gets colder make sure you don’t get snow soaked, and keep your feet dry. Keep your nose warm as the virus develops in cold nasal passages. There is also a first defense nasal spray that prevents the cold viruses from developing in your nose.
 
   Yes keep in good health if you like, but when the bird flu pandemic hits you will likely get the flu so you will have to think about surviving.
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Tips for surviving the flu

* Note: The Public Health Agency of Canada is preparing for an avian flu pandemic. Ottawa has stockpiled 20m doses of anti-viral drugs. It will produce a vaccine as soon as one is available.
 
Law and Order: It will break down so folks in local areas will have to make plans to form local militias before the bad guys take over. Don’t listen to the politicians, they want to create a system where they are in control and we simply don’t have enough cops and so on for them to do it. Most of the cops live outside of Toronto and would stay out if a pandemic hit. Act quickly because any police and military will be immediately pinned down trying to protect clinics and shops from gangs and looters. Banks will shut down so you'll need a supply of cash. Credit transactions may fail and most stuff will be on a black market.

 
Flu Treatment – avian flu causes fever etc.
 
   There are only two drugs which work to soften the symptoms of all possible pandemic strains, Tamiflu and Relenza. These are mostly sold out or in government stocks, but get them if possible. They most likely won’t work well on avian flu. It is unlikely that there will be enough of any vaccine as bird flu vaccines are hard to manufacture, so most of us will be open to the virus. If riots break out with citizens fighting to get a limited supply of any vaccine at clinics, it may be best to avoid them altogether. A key reason is that any vaccine is expected to be given in two doses. If it's hard to get the first one you'll likely never get the second one. Don't forget that flu vaccines need to work on your system for a couple weeks or more to build your antibodies and immunity, and that current vaccines are only 30 to 70 percent effective. A vaccine is not a cure, even with ample supplies a large number of people will succumb to the flu. Most likely any vaccine will come too late and there won't be much if any left for the public.
   The pharmaceutical companies are now beginning mass vaccination in Europe and Canada and elsewhere of flu vaccines and stuff like Tamiflu that will not work on a pandemic virus. In other words they are using the scare to make billions.

   Once a pandemic arrives in Toronto, the public health department will co-ordinate distribution of vaccines and Tamiflu, but consider documented reports of people going crazy and committing suicide after using Tamiflu, and the fact that it will have little effect on bird flu. Many people will refuse to take it.

   The vaccine will go to priority groups and they'll need two doses. The Public Health Agency of Canada in its pandemic plan lists them as all health care workers, police, armed forces, emergency workers, elected officials, government workers, funeral staff, transportation employees. Only after all these people have been vaccinated will persons in nursing homes, persons with high risk medical conditions, the elderly, children and an estimated 200,000 pregnant women receive the vaccine.

   A little thinking then tells us that there won't be enough vaccine for the weak or the public. Our Pandemic Plan is a plan to Save Our Government While the rest of us get sick and DIE! A decision on whether to vaccinate healthy adults and teens will only come after a pandemic occurs, and that decision will obviously be that there isn't enough medical supply to vaccinate or treat. Even if there was the most optimistic guess is that it would take four months to vaccinate the whole population, and you can be sure that the flu will spread faster that that.

   As for the rest of the Canadian Government's plan for dealing with a Pandemic (Canadian Pandemic Influenza Plan). Well, it isn't a plan of any merit. The plan notes that we need to develop a special study of protocols that can be activated at the time of a pandemic. The current system of vaccination is the building block of the plan. The rest hasn't been worked out yet. It is just a pile of recommendations with talk of simulation exercises that haven't happened. The authority structure with the feds working with the provinces has been defined, but they don't tell you what exactly has been done or what our level of preparedness is. The way it is laid out almost everything will be decided and done on the fly during a pandemic when as many as eleven million people could become ill in Canada. So to believe in this plan you need to have deep faith in government. As many as 58,000 could die.

   If a pandemic is announced by the WHO the feds will activate the pandemic phase of CPIC and allocate scare vaccine supplies and emergency response teams. There is no plan for dealing with societal breakdown. Here in Toronto we'll likely suddenly find ourselves in New Orleans style chaos. The Mounties are the folks in charge of law and order in Canada's plan, and there must be five of them in the whole of Toronto.

      Ontario Health Minister George Smitherman said he hasn’t even seen the Toronto plan for a flu pandemic… indicating that the Ontario government is bristling with incompetence. And he doesn’t like the idea of giving hospitals more money to prepare for an influx of patients.

   The City of Toronto has no plan for who would wear masks, who would pay to stockpile cheap caskets, whether schools would close and how mass vaccinations would be distributed. Our hospitals and other health services are ill-equipped.

   The city's divisions, agencies, boards and commissions and things like police, ambulance, transit, garbage collection and property inspection are not prepared for mass absenteeism and service disruptions a pandemic would cause. And it is not known whether commuters will be required to wear masks if they travel by public transit during a pandemic.

   Though Canada has no plan, Britain has a plan for mitigating the worst effects of a pandemic that includes closing schools, theatres and public buildings; cancelling mass gatherings such as sporting events; suspending international flights from infected countries; deploying police to deal with public disorder; setting up special centres to dispense the anti-viral drug Tamiflu; and encouraging people to observe basic hygiene.
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Food supplies in the developed world where diets are of purchased food will be badly hit. There’ll be no food so stock up on canned food and water and pet food, whatever you will need. Our society runs on just-in-time-delivery and when a lot of people get sick and law and order starts to break down goods won't be available.

 
You’ll also need vitamins and vitamin C, Tylenol, aspirin and other painkillers that relieve fever, a stock of your own personnel medication, too.
 
Try Kaopectate for diarrhea if you get it. There are also many natural foods and medications for strengthening your health and eliminating diarrhea.
 
You’ll need cough syrup, cold meds, a supply of water, soup, drinks.
 
Get self waterers and feeders for your pets as you may be too sick to feed them.
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When government help fails to come you’ll have to treat yourself and your family.

Don't forget that hospitals will be overwhelmed and only the worst cases will be handled there.

You'll be sick 7 to 10 days, much longer if you get pneumonia, and if it's a really bad flu you'll feel weak and slightly ill for weeks after. The first 3 or 4 days are usually the worst, so you need to get over them and hope pneumonia doesn't set in.