Voluntary Isolation - Governent Intervention

The current plan is for everyone to be isolated at home for 3 reasons:

Good point about the government having to feed and take care of you.  And, yeah, I can imagine nothing worse than being forced to go to a shelter or out in public.

No plan unless or until martial law is declared.

Then you could be ordered to remove and bury the dead as an emergency sanitation crisis.

 

Turboguy

Floridagirl.  I fear some kind of draft - people being made to volunteer to nurse etc., or to go to work in a crisis, just to help keep the economy going.  Even if we don't work in essential utilities etc.  Penpushers will be needed too.  And people to face the public - supplying food, welfare cheques etc.  What   does everyone think?  Beth

A corpse needs about 2200 degrees for an extended amount of time to burn, so just pouring some gasoline on won't do the trick.  Plus, it will actually help spread the virus because of the various hot and cold spots within the fire. Anyone who has ever started a campfire, remember the ambers floating around??? No, I think it will have to be trenches, far away from a water source.

FEMVET is right on. Cremation is not something that can be done efficiently in the back yard.
Use LIME.
or
Just bury six feet down. That will keep the animals from digging them up.

Scott

floridagirl wrote: Thanks for the good information Blue Sky.  What you are saying is a relief! What I'm really wondering about is there a plan in place where healthy citizens would be forced out of their homes to work?  I'm guessing that since you said 40% of the current government and medical community could be sick, would they call on healthy people just sitting at home to help out and fill the shortage of labor?

WOW!!! Guess that answers my question...

Back online tonight.  THe question posed was can, and will, the government compell you to work?   Perhaps some could interpret some Executive Orders in such a light ( I dont), but I will tell you no.  What I and many have found (even in the military) is that coercion is a complete waste of time.  Its that whole "you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink" story.  You can't force people to work and expect anything productive.

You can however, appeal to human nature, to a citizens sense of community and ask for help.  Also, there is some discussion on the local government level about how to organize volunteers to do low-skill but very important jobs.  Of special focus, is the good news story that within weeks of when the first wave hits you will have thousands of people who had become sick but got well and then have immunity --the hope is that those people can step forward and help their neighbors, their hospitals, the red cross, etc.

You are not going to get drafted, no government agency has a plan or the will or the resources to force you to work.  Even the military hates the idea of a draft.

BlueSky wrote: Back online tonight.  THe question posed was can, and will, the government compell you to work?   Perhaps some could interpret some Executive Orders in such a light ( I dont), but I will tell you no.  What I and many have found (even in the military) is that coercion is a complete waste of time.  Its that whole "you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink" story.  You can't force people to work and expect anything productive. You can however, appeal to human nature, to a citizens sense of community and ask for help.  Also, there is some discussion on the local government level about how to organize volunteers to do low-skill but very important jobs.  Of special focus, is the good news story that within weeks of when the first wave hits you will have thousands of people who had become sick but got well and then have immunity --the hope is that those people can step forward and help their neighbors, their hospitals, the red cross, etc. You are not going to get drafted, no government agency has a plan or the will or the resources to force you to work.  Even the military hates the idea of a draft.

As for how do you know you know if you have immunity...the answer is, the only 100% certain way is a blood test to check for antibodies.  Even then (as cathypeanut) points out you will only have 100% immunity to the exact strain that infected you.  However, that means you will have very high immunity to its near-term mutuation.  Lets say H5N1* infects you.  You recover.  It mutates into H5N1**, your immune system still recognizes this close H5N1* cousin, and although you may get sick agin, it is far less likely and even if you do, it is more likely you will be less sick and recover more quickly.  There is considerable case evidence of this happening in 1918 as people lived through sucessive waves.

As for what you can do...I'm with FemVet, learn first aid, check with the Red Cross now about their volunteer programs.  Get to know your neighbors, or maybe there is an elderly couple that gets delivered meals everyday now --maybe you can plan on filling in for a "meals on wheels" driver in a pandemic.  If you are a truck driver/or have other skills, maybe in the event of the worse case, you can volunteer with the city to drive supply trucks (although very, very few communities are starting skilled volunteer lists at this point). 

 

I think it is great that you might want to help!