Scary for business: U.S. bracing for massive flu disruptions

[Paul N]

Very scary scenario indeed. Read the article on CNN.

Also, I think people should be prepared and start having enough food & water supplies at home.

Here's link to article:

Bird Flu (http://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/conditions/05/02/us.birdflu.ap/index.html)

[AnneL]

Last time I checked, bird flu hasn't acquired the ability to pass from person to person. This is just another "if, when, maybe" scare, like duct taping your windows to be prepared for terrorist attacks. I think high gas prices will have more of an effect on business in the near future than a flu epidemic since we are pretty close to done with flu season.

By the way, has anyone heard about the outbreak of mumps in the midwest? Maybe we should all close our doors till that one passes. :eek:

[DenKym]

Originally posted by AnneL:
Last time I checked, bird flu hasn't acquired the ability to pass from person to person. This is just another "if, when, maybe" scare, like duct taping your windows to be prepared for terrorist attacks. I think high gas prices will have more of an effect on business in the near future than a flu epidemic since we are pretty close to done with flu season.

By the way, has anyone heard about the outbreak of mumps in the midwest? Maybe we should all close our doors till that one passes. :eek: /agreed... another "sky is falling" tongue.gif

The mumps outbreak is a little closer to home.. something like over 600 cases in Iowa. About 120 here in Nebraska.

[Rick Granick]

Saw a promo for a bird flu movie-of-the-week. How tacky/irresponsible is that? Looks like Stacy Keach will be handing out the bad news.
:mad: Rick

[Emibub]

One of the news magazine shows covered the bird flu a couple weeks ago, I think 60 Minutes. I turned the channel. I'm one of the sky is falling believers too. I didn't duct tape my windows or buy a gas mask in 2001, I didn't stock up on water and cash for Y2K and I will sit on the fence with this one too. If there is no vaccination it looks like it will be out of our hands if it comes to be anyway.

[AnneL]

There are now over 1000 cases of mumps in Iowa. There have been about 20 or 30 in Wisconsin. Even people who were vaccinated have gotten it because in some people the vaccine doesn't take and others only got 1 of the 2 required shots.

I emailed my daughter a few weeks ago to warn her since college campuses are one of the main places they are seeing cases. Her reply was "We're not worried about mumps, three of people I live with have mono. We're worried about that instead." :eek:

[Mecianne]

Originally posted by Rick Granick:
Saw a promo for a bird flu movie-of-the-week. How tacky/irresponsible is that? Looks like Stacy Keach will be handing out the bad news.
:mad: Rick I saw this too. Absolutely ridiculous. Their promo said something like...."We're ahead of the media on the story that everyone in America should see." Spin doctors...everyone of them. :mad: Drives me nuts. I'm like Kathy, I just flip the channel. I hardly watch the news anymore. Figgered I don't need high blood pressure at such an early age.

[trapper]

If any one can show me what worrying will do to help the situation..I will join in immediately and start worrrying. In the meantime !
Think I will go out and watch one of our glaziers melt..

[Mike LeCompte CPF]

think I brought this up awhil eback and my answer is the same:

Lock all doors
Kepp shotgun at front door
Be prepared to stay inside for at least one year
When you go out, wear mask and surgical gloves
Keep kids home from school--screw the auth0rities 'cause they[re as scared as you are
Invest in muni bonds/gold or any other financial instrument whose interest rates boom when the market crashes 'cause the market will crash

and O yeah==sell the business or auction it off. ain't no one coming in anyway.

cheers

[trapper]

http://www.emergencyemail.org/newsemergency/templates/templatestandard1.asp?articleid=66&zoneid=1
oh well!
Birds don't get ya something will.

[BILL WARD]

saw on telly yesterday(?) the government's learned take on this is we will be closing @40%of all businesses and people shouldnt stand within 3 feet of each other. certainly hope this was the newsy's interpretation and NOT the gov's position!!!! this tastes of "close you eyes and it dissappears"!!!!!!

if I understand it at allthis is how it goes: 1) bird flue IS on its way or ALREADY here--migratory flights, 2)it WILL be passed to the resident populations(anyone the Thanksgiving hotdogs or Colonel Sanders zucini???), 3) if it can pass to humans it WILL pass to all other food animals too, 4) as there are only 1 or 2 vacine makers in the world(NONE in the US!!!) there wont be but @ 20% of our populace innoculated(IF virus doesnt mutate and IF they can isolate it/culture it, IF they can develope the appropriate vascine agaist it).

[JFeig]

OK... I know I am one of the older framers here.

Many of us remember when all the parks and swiming pools were closed in the summer. Whenever there was a POLIO outbreak.

[seido]

Remember the 70's hysteria of "Swine Flu" shots, Gerald Ford's contribution to America during his presidency?

Got the shot and except for the curly tail I grew, nothing ever happened!!!

Oink, oink,

Joel

[Rick Granick]

this tastes of "close you eyes and it dissappears"How cynical can you get? Don't you remember how effective the old "duck and cover" recommendations were? Or the more recent color-coded alerts and duct tape instructions? ....Look for a major media blitz just before the next election.
:eek: Rick

[Doug Gemmell]

The husband of one of my employees was conviced by his neice to buy a case of masks for over $100 as protection against this IMMINENT THREAT.

The niece works for.....you guessed it....the company that manufactures the masks.

Employee not too happy with husband. :rolleyes:

[JPete]

If you were born prior to 1978 and have not had an MMR booter shot, you should probably get one. The mumps can be serious.

My mother-in-law was an early test case with parkinson's disease. She had the swine flu in the early ninteen hundreds. I have a theory that the shots from the 70's still may have caused parkinson's in young people.

The bird flu is here but is only affecting birds at the moment. Some consultants are going around the country making big money scaring everyone talking about the deaths of children and people in other countries. They played catch with the heads of the birds. I'm sure it will come and many will die but many will die regardless.

I refuse to buy any more duct tape, new VCR or worry about the sky falling.

[Baer Charlton]

I hate the panic sales as much as the other guy, but the avian flu is no joke. The vet world is very nervous right now as we are experiencing an "avian flu like" ailment in horses. And they haven't figured it out really, or where it came from.

The "Jump" is what is the key to a pan-demic. Right now it is a "physical" contact with the birds or droppings that has killed those people. What has the medical [CDC] worried is the strain mutating into an "air-bourn" strain which can be passed person to person the same as regular flus and colds.

As for the Swine Flu and the Hong Kong Flu that killed thousands of elderly in the 70s, what kept it from going pan-demic was the T43 nature of the strain. It just didn't have the "shelf life" in the body to ramp up the infection spread. Which means the infected became "sick" to fast and stayed home [isolated] and didn't infect a wide enough cross section.

The nature of modern times brings the tipping point down to a critical T28 today. Airplanes are full, people stand in many more lines today, workers are huddled closer [cubies] and there is a pressure to come to work even if you are sick that was not present in the late 60s and 70s.

[Jay H]

I'm still a puppy and I remember the SARS scare. Then it was the madcow scare. Heck there is even a series of books out there, "Left Behind", that warns us of the rapture. It just never ends.

[Baer Charlton]

Yup, you said it Jay; 'you're still a puppy'.

Madcow was 1998, SARS was 2002.

Scare tactics sell papers and TV space. That's why they lead that ****. We watch the world news and more and more it leads with the days death toll in Iraq. [some of us remember the last 4 years of VN and Uncle Walter starting every broadcast with that day,week and total tally.]
The local news ALWAYS starts with "who shot who", unless it is time for "STORM WATCH 2006". I'd rather hear about answers to the problems like the thread on hydrogen cars... heck I drive a Prius and I didn't know about half of those cars.

With a little more hope in this world, people would stop turning to dope.

[Mike LeCompte CPF]

But on a more serious note: our local rag is running a multipart section on this outbreak. Seems it will be a serious flu, though not as bad as the Spanish variety in the turn of the century, they think--accent on They Think. Should last about four months and come in waves a few months apart.

So I change my scenario: close the business for a few months, stay home or retreat to the NC mountains where there is effing NO ONE arond or join my son in Hawaii for a multimonth vacation, then come back when the wave recedes. Pay the landlord to keep the place in my name and just don't open. Can't imagine business would be that brisk anyway.

I mean what's a coupla bucks compared to your health?

But the point is, the "experts" are sying it probably will be nasy fluwise but nowhere near the fatal stuff once predicted.

and all this is IF it ever comes to pass.

Left Behind indeed. Someone's reading too much fiction lately

[Greg Fremstad]

I wonder what ever happend to the "Toxic Shock Syndrom"

and... Why did some men get it. Were men using tampons?

[MarkyW]

Believe it or not, but there was an article in my local newspaper about a week ago (I might still have it, but I'm not going to go digging for it right now). But the town 5 miles down the road from me, which happens to also be the county seat, is thinking about passing a law that, because of avian flu concerns, would ban barnyard type animals such as chickens, goats and pot-bellied pigs. (I didn't know you could have barnyard animals in the city currently) They would allow standard pets i.e. cats and dogs. I don't recall the article mentioning anything about hamsters or ferrets, or even for that matter canaries or parrots (and they are birds.

Chickens and goats and pigs...oh my! (apologies to the Wizard of Oz)

[Tim Hayes.]

I have the answer Bird Flu (http://www.flashplayer.com/games/birdflu.html) <--- click here - then click image with orange sky