Bok bok bok bok bok.

Andrea Batista Schlesinger

Bok bok bok bok bok.

Yesterday, President Bush announced his plan to prepare for an outbreak of avian flu. His plan calls for spending 1.2 billion to buy 20 million doses of a vaccine.

20 million? Why that's only enough to cover 6.7 percent of the American population! But let's not be too surprised. Fact is, there are lots of ways in which we tolerate some things being true for ten percent of the population that aren't for the rest.

For example, the wealthiest 10% own 71% of all private wealth in this country and the richest 10 percent of families own about 85 percent of all outstanding stocks.

But instead of complaining, as the left is wont to do, let's come up with some ideas for how to pick the lucky seven:

You could give the vaccine to everyone who lives in poverty... but it wouldn't be enough, because 12.7 percent of Americans are technically impoverished.

You could give it to the Americans without health insurance, but shoot... it wouldn't be enough, because 15.7 percent of Americans are uninsured.

You could give it to American households that do not have an adequate supply of food, but... oh, I can't believe this, it just wouldn't be enough. In fact, you'd be short 13 million vaccinations.

Or maybe to the eight percent of workers in the private sector who are union members. But that doesn't seem fair, since 42 million Americans according to recent polls would join a union if they could. Rubbing it in wouldn't be very brotherly.

Well, needless to say, we're sure the White House is hard at work figuring out how to divvy up the doses in the absolute fairest way. But if you have any suggestions, please send them our way and we'll gladly pass them on.

Andrea Batista Schlesinger: Author Bio | Other Posts
Posted at 10:20 AM, Nov 02, 2005 in Economy
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Comments

Effect Measure has a great post on the new plan. I don't know if you know anything about influenza, but the real point of agreement between you and public health specialists is how the decay in our public health infrastructure directly feeds into a pandemic vulnerability.

There's an even more recent survey http://www.aflcio.org/joinaunion/how/upload/vatw_issuebrief.pdf indicating that 57 million non-union workers would join a union if they could. Their right to organize is blocked AND they won't get the flu vaccine--coincidence?

Thanks for the link and trackback to Effect Measure, Matt and elana. The post is to the point. Also glad to know about this blog. Also to the point.

Andrea,
You might be interested in the November edition of Scientific American, "Preparing for a Pandemic" especially the section: Vaccines: Who Will Get Them and How Quickly? (page 3)

sorry, which you can read at www.sciam.com

How About Public Health ?

May be we should try to approach this from the front end rather than the back-end.

How about we prevent an outbreak like other countries have moved to do ?

Check-out Eygpt and maybe Israel and the rest of Asia.

The real issue may come out being are corporate profits more important than public health of United States' citizens ? I think maybe people are going to have to come together at a different table pretty quick...to minimize losses in a lot of different areas.

Posted by: Reverend Michele P. Ellison | November 7, 2005 02:59 PM

A little reactionary discussion: who decides and how?

11/6/2005

Let me put on my paranoid reactionary hat. Many of you will have read the following in the New York Times. My comments below...

October 8, 2005
Bush Plan Shows U.S. Is Not Ready for Deadly Flu By Gardiner Harris
...
A key point of contention if an epidemic strikes is who will get vaccines first. The administration's plan suggests a triage distribution for these essential medicines. Groups like the military, National Guard and other national security groups were left out.
Beyond the military, however, the first in line for essential medicines are workers in plants making the vaccines and drugs as well as medical personnel working directly with those sickened by the disease. Next are the elderly and severely ill. Then come pregnant women, transplant and AIDS patients, and parents of infants. Finally, the police, firefighters and government leaders are next.
The plan also calls for a national stockpile of 133 million courses of antiviral treatment. The administration has bought 4.3 million.
...
(Link to source)

This kind of stupid, short-sighted "planning" drives me crazy!! Why can we never find people willing to discuss and actually make the hard decisions we need to have made? "The elderly, the severely ill, and transplant and AIDS patients" should not even be considered in the calculations for treatment in a pandemic.

Yes that means my elderly mother, and some of my friends -- and possibly even my husband -- might die of the pandemic flu, whichever virus it turns out to be. Yes, that's a dreadful and hard thing to consider. But there are two types of triage -- one is standard medical triage (treat first those injured or ill most likely to survive; which applies in a shorter-term, less-than-globally-catastrophic situation). The other triage, and in the case of the pandemic, the one that HAS to over-ride the first, is the long-term continuation of the ... the ... the tribe, the nation, the civilization. We must first protect the personnel necessary for social order and the continuation of the infrastructure, technology, and food production needed to keep the country going. The distribution of vaccines and such ameliorative methodologies as we can come up with needs to be focused on continuation of the SOCIETY, not on the individual members -- especially not the weakest members!

And yes, that means every country for itself. The United States doesn't have the drugs, the money, or the personnel to try to save every little two-bit country across the world. Or even any of the 16-bit ones. Does anyone really believe Switzerland will continue to export Tamiflu after the pandemic begins? (After all, Roche has already stopped exporting to AMerica just to prevent "hoarding"!) Or will they (I'd suggest correctly) use their supplies for their own people? There is nothing rational or normal about letting your own family/people die in order to save someone else's family/people.

Such vaccine as we are able to get or manufacture should be given first to medical personnel; then police, firefighters, and the military (but probably NOT those off fighting a foolish war unrelated to the continuation and health of our country!); and those workers necessary for the continuation of the services required to keep the society running.

That means the folks operating services such as potable water and sewer services and food production/delivery and electricity generation and distribution. Think about what happens if the electricity plant workers in NYC all fall sick; how will NYC manage for a week or more without electricity -- and with no other city able to provide help? Even if, say, Chicago has electrical workers to spare, it wouldn't be able to send them -- quarantine/travel restrictions, Chicago's own need for back-up workers if their workers get sick, and the workers' (rightful) unwillingness to jeopardize their own lives by travel means NYC is on its own! If NYC has "wasted" their vaccine/treatments on the elderly and transplant patients, and their infrastructure personnel get sick, the elderly and transplant patients will likely die in the riots, and cold or heat and dark that will follow.

Hospitals fail without electricity: Katrina was a trial-run, and we FAILED! You cannot have nurses hand-bagging 100,000 flu victims when the power goes out!. Many elderly and medically compromised people will die -- that's tragic -- but their age and medical status do not and cannot put them at the head of the line for restricted resources. Their contribution to the continuation of the *society* is nowhere NEAR as necessary as those folks who keep the society running.

Sadly, that does mean politicians of some sort will also have to be protected -- but I'd suggest a determination of the necessity of the top levels of (which) certain agencies and not many of the mid- and low-level govt employees. Some employees of the Department of Agriculture are important for managing the production and transport of food supplies -- but the guys assigned to "sell more sugar" should have to wait for medicine/vaccine just like all the other non-essential personnel -- because they are!

The attitude of the New York Times writer is typical of the frustrating blindness of most people -- they refuse to recognize that Nature means some people die. (Well, ALL people die, just some much earlier than others.) Our idiotic society, which has (over-)protected so many members from a familiarity with Nature and death, has created an expectation (at all levels) that "big Daddy govt" can save them. When the pandemic comes, there is no question that the govt can't (possibly) save them, and people will die, and it will be lots and lots of people. So why can't we just accept that, and try to do our best to keep our SOCIETY continuing through and after the pandemic? If we "waste" the vaccine on the elderly and medically compromised, and don't save it for the people who, by chance or vocational choice, are necessary to keep the majority of the population from falling into anarchy and destruction, is that a good choice?

Did not the lessons of Katrina have any impact on these people? If the police desert as in New Orleans (or, as it turns out -- were phantom employees who didn't exist at all!), or are struck down (sick or dead) by the pandemic, as would happen were they NOT the first in line for vaccines and treatment -- who will keep order in the streets? Do people truly believe anything has changed since Katrina? Will the black poor be any more prepared or any less likely to riot and loot? (And oh, come on: If we're going to be facing a global pandemic, it's time to start speaking the truth! It's NOT the white poor who riot and loot! Remember Watts, Cincinnati, Newark, Detroit, Los Angeles, Chicago, New Orleans?! More than 30 cities in this country have seen black riots. Shall we pretend it's not true, and develop our plans on the basis of politically correct lies? Didn't they do that before Katrina? Look what happened there! Can you honestly say it's not going to happen again next time? Remember Toledo just a couple of weeks ago, anyone?!)

If our plans to manage this pandemic are based on foolish and politically correct falsehoods, how will this society survive? If we vaccinate grannies and AIDS patients before firefighters, who will fight the fires? (Does anyone think fires WON'T break out just because everyone is sick?) If we vaccinate parents of infants before first responders and police, who will staff the ambulances and the hospital emergency rooms and who will keep order in the streets? It WON'T be the elderly and the medically compromised!

I also prioritize the parents of young children and pregnant women *after* the people necessary to keep the society running. As harsh as it sounds -- children and parents can be replaced (numerically, not individually; the govt is SUPPOSED to be planning for the country, not the individual!). The necessity for a continued/maintained/repaired infrastructure of the country for those who survive, and those who, after the pandemic finally ends, can become parents to orphans, and new parents, is higher than the necessity for current parents and children!

But no, we'll continue lying and prevaricating right up until the lights go out and the rioting starts.

Avalanche

right avalanch, white people don't riot-- they set up concentration camps to decide who lives and who dies.

or how about this

white riots like:
Pogroms
Mai Lai
Lynchings

do you think that people that don't look like you are genetically pre-destined to riot?

NO wait, don't answer because apparently everyone in my apartment building is a dangerous rioter and I should join you in duckstepping.