WorkingThrough a Pandemic

Blade, welcome aboard!

You asked some fabulous questions!

Decon... a problem I have spent a great deal of brain cells on.  So here's my take:

Outside (or garage, or camper) - strip and discard clothing into a water bleach solution in a plastic tub.  Shower thoroughly, still outside.  Don clean clothing, sack, towel, whatever.  Don a procedure mask (the cheap thingies).  Enter house.  No one allowed physical contact with "outlander".  Outlander will be treated as if he/she were indeed contagious.

Hope it helps.  A massive problem with no easy answers.

SZ

I don't have an employer as I am a Private Builder/Contractor, but things will come to a screeching halt for me when "the ballon goes up".  There would be no way I would be "going into work" when this thing hits.

Most people are going to go inside their homes and lock the doors when this event ocurrs until they run out out of things essential.  That means the electricity is going to shut off in short order, telecommunications are going to stop, news broadcast are ceasing entirely... In short, everything is going to "short-circut".

It's best, honestly, it's required, in my opinion, that we take care of our families above all else.

Guys

Thanks to all.   I am becoming more and more convinced the solution is to just isolate my family at home and wait for a pandemic to pass. The primary flaw in this is being able to defend my home in the event of food riots and other civil unrest.  My wife is on board with preparing, but she hasn' t bought in to the point she is willing to sell our home and move to a rural location where we could be more isolated and self sufficient.

The trick is determining the decision point. If you guess too late, it may mean infection and spreading it to family.  If you decide too early, you risk unemployment and a possible financial catastrophe and there is always the possibility there may be no Avian Flu pandemic after an initial scare/false alarm which would label you as a paranoid nut with a seriously impacted (negative) career. This is why I think preparing for this is far more difficult than preparing for a world altering cataclysm, known in the zombie fearing world as TEOTWAKI.

I am a government worker employed by the military and I am also retired from the military.  One of the scary things to me, is that there are no visibile plans to continue work and still protect the military and civilian work force and their families.  I haven't figured the latter out yet.  I will still receive a retirement check no matter what (unless the entire country collapses),  but it covers just a little more than my mortgage payment.  Worst case, I could survive for many months with what I have stored (food, water, fuel) and my own personal protection tools and pay my mortgage.  I have enough savings that I would have a nest egg to start a new job search after the crisis has passed.

Welcome Bladerunner, I look forward to seeing more of your ideas and thoughts.

I wonder how safe we will be in the woods if the cats, dogs, pigs ,crows, bears, get the H5N1.  Even fish according to Joe.

IMO your safest in your neighborhoods, people who know you and you know, makes it easier to defend someone you know. 

This is sure developing in the last two weeks!!

Welcome Bladerunner,

Personal Protective Clothing/Equipment (PPE) and Decontamination are my forte.

If you will be around (within 1 meter) people/birds/animals that are infected with the H5N1 virus, your goal is to not become contaminated and infected (sorry for being so obvious). This is a big subject that will take some more research on your part but it appears you already have a good start.

Best case is don't be around sick folk.

Next, if you will be near contamination, cover yourself top to bottom: Tyvek coveralls with hood, eye protection goggles, good N95 mask, nitrile gloves, durable show covers.

Remove before entering your home/car. Wear new PPE daily. If you are caring for a sick person, that person should wear a mask to reduce the amount of shedding of virus. The care giver should wear complete PPE. A person sick with H5 will be very sick. All bodily fluids should be avoided and there will be plenty of them. Ask a nurse or doctor about 'isolation technique' and 'universal precautions' for bodily fluids. Protection is not difficult with good equipment and information.

See our Medical section there is alot of good posts. Please send me a Personal Message or email any time for questions about PPE etc.

Welcome.

Hi, I am a new member and just read your question.  I just finished re-reading a book, 'The Hot Zone' by Richard Preston.  It is the true sotry of the discovery of 'Ebola Reston'; a type of Ebola virus that is 100% fatal to monkeys and found its way into Reston VA. In it, he outlines the government's procedures for protecting their workers from deadly viruses while working directly with them.  At the time he wrote the book in 1994, the procedure was to wear surgical scrubs (no underwear) under negatively pressured biological space-suits.  They had rubber gloves, which were covered by really heavy gloves and big rubber boots.  The gloves and the boots were taped to seal the ankles and wrists, and they wrapped extra tape around the ankle so they could quickly tape up a tear in their suits.  Their air supply comes in from hoses suspended in the ceiling.   When the workers are done working in the Level 4 Bio-Containment Area they have to stand in a disinfectant shower for several minutes, stand under ultra-violet light (which de-composes the virus) etc... If anyone is suspected of exposure they put them in a lockdown medical facilty called the "Slammer".  The closest a civilian could come to this would be a Tyvek suit with a hood and a respirator  Conceivably the Tyvek suit could be sprayed down with bleach and water  after going "out" (make sure That's okay with the Tyvek material and won't break it down).  This would be really hard to do by yourself.  Then you would put your scrubs in a bag, spray that with bleach, put them in another bag and spray that as well.  The procedure I outlined above is the one that USAMRIID used to handle what they call Level 4 "hot agents" .  One of those hot agents is Marburg virus that is contagious to humans, and has a 25% death rate.  Another is Ebola Reston, which will cause an immune response in humans but will not make them sick.   It is very close, from a mutation point to being able to infect humans.  In this way, it is a lot like bird flu; but Ebola Reston pops up every once in a while in a monkey population and then disappears.  The avian flu just keeps on coming.   What is very disturbing to me is that the avian flu has a death rate of 50% and has jumped species from birds to mammals.  This is a very scary uncontained 'hot agent'; and our government is really slow in responding.      

I can't imagine you or anyone else going to work every day in a Tyvek suit with a respirator, and having your wife suit up to spray you down where you can't reach when you get home on a day by day basis.  It just ain't happenin'.  I think it is really important to remember that we are all in the same boat.  There are very few people out there who can afford to miss any significant amount of work.  But if this actually happens, that won't matter very much.  What will matter are the people that we love.  I know that I could be financially ruined by this, but then again so could everybody else.  I did see somebody out there recommending we invest in certain pharmaceutical research company stocks.  Good Lord. 

I just think that no one is talking about it because they're afraid if they do it will be real.  It is just to scary.  My husband died of leukemia several years ago -- we had an understanding.  He read the financial timesvery close to the end.  A lot of people on this web site are not talking at all!  If the time comes to stop going to work, you'll know when it is, and you won't look foolish.  We work to take care of our families, after all. 

move to a rural location where we could be more isolated and self sufficient.(quote)

I am in rural area and I can tell you we have just as much difficulty as the next person....

Welcome aboard..and excellent question, this is one of those questions that keeps coming up over and over again...and I,m glad it does...

Each of us will have to take our steps in quarintine one small step at a time...I have school aged children and if I pull them out of school to fast I am sure someone will be a knocking at my door, but when is it to late to take those precautions...

And with all of us in different parts of the world, one persons time to hide may be anothers time to get last minute preps..

Now as for working read up on the 1918 pandemic alot of people did not show up for there jobs and those that could were paid alot of money to dig holes for mass graves..they had to bring out of college the 3-4 year med students to fill the roll as doctors...alot of front line workers died of this and with the over flow of sick people....well you get my drift...

Best thing to do is read read read and keep updated on things going on around you...I found out the hard way the holes in my preps when hydro was down for 6.5 hours...be prepared for the worst case scenario and if it is a mild pandemic you will have enough to help neighbours and freinds and extra family members...and most places of employment have been asked to put a pandemic plan intpo place , if your place of employment does not have one yet you can google the information and I would recomend taking copies into your employer and ask if the information can be reviewed..include a few of your co-workers if they are reading up on this..or inform them of your intentions and ask if they would join you in puuting a plan into place....

and if your mailman has sneezed on your mail and you touch it...and you find out the next day he has died of the avian flu...so you have avoided the bird pooh on the concrete but you opened your mail and hummmm...

And welcome sheilad1

Hi, Sheilad1

Welcome aboard. For your travelling family member: People can carry the virus for up to 8 days before they get sick, some estimates are saying up to 12. Please take that into consideration. I would think he needs to be in quarantine for 14 days to keep everybody safe or he needs to come earlier.

As for the mail, put the outer paper in the garbage and run a small UV light over the actual mail. You can get them for about $8.

glad to hear that you're thinking about your dog. I'm afraid that very many people will abandon their pets.

Looking forward to your input.