#181
Over the last couple of months, the number of high profile pandemic preparedness meetings have increased, and they are getting a fair amount of play in the news media. Stalwarts like Dr. Michael Osterholm of CIDRAP (Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy) continue to push the message that a pandemic may be just around the corner. The WHO, the CDC, and other international organizations are holding virtual conferences on the web, where health officials from many countries are comparing notes and devising strategies for dealing with a pandemic. And even local town meetings are beginning to talk about `unthinkable’ scenarios.
While all of these are good things, they are coming a bit late in the game.
Quite frankly, we’ve known another pandemic would someday arrive for more than a century. There have been many in the past, and they tend to occur roughly every 30 to 40 years. Our last `scare’ was in 1976, when Swine Flu was feared that it would spark a pandemic. It didn’t, and as soon as that threat passed, we went back to sleep.
And we’ve squandered 30 years in the process.
Now, it’s late in the game, and our collective backs are against the wall. Governments and health care providers are wringing their hands, saying there is little they can do should a pandemic erupt. We’ve been told to expect little or no help should this occur, and to plan on fending for ourselves.
Nice.
Had we learned from our past, taken heed of the warnings of 1918, 1957, 1968, and yes, even 1976, we’d have built an infrastructure capable of handling, at least in part, a pandemic. Even a fraction of the money we’ve wasted on congressional pork projects over the past 30 years would have made a huge difference. But instead, we threw a party, spend money like a sailor on leave, and now proclaim there is nothing we can do.
And at this late date, they are probably right.
If, by some miracle, we dodge the H5N1 virus, and avoid a pandemic, I expect the will to continue to prepare will be lost. We’ll go back to sleep, and let the next generation suffer the consequences. It seems, we never learn.
For now, though, the powers-that-want-to-continue-to-be are making a mad scramble to show they really care, and are doing `everything possible’ to head off a pandemic. They issue warnings (quietly, so as not to alarm the populace), hold meetings, and issue glossy reports with impressive charts and graphs. They put themselves on record, so they can say `We told you so”, later, after a pandemic happens.
None of this is to suggest there aren’t genuine heroes in this battle. There are. Dr. Osterholm, for one, has been a vocal proponent of pandemic preparedness for years. Dr. Robert Webster, of St. Jude’s Hospital, is our most celebrated flu hunter, and has long warned of the dangers of H5N1. And Dr. David Nabarro, who has been tirelessly sounding the alarm at the UN for a couple of years. All deserve kudos.
But the vast majority of leaders and health officials has simply been paying lip service, and has not been serious about pandemic preparedness. Not until recently, anyway.
Suddenly, many more are on the bandwagon. They see the ominous signs, and while they admit it may be too late to mitigate the effects of a pandemic, they are beginning to talk about it.
Progress, I suppose.
And perhaps it will do some good. At this point, we don’t know if we have days, weeks, months, or years before a pandemic breaks out. If we have years, and we can sustain these efforts, then it likely will have helped.
But part of me remembers something from my medic days. Something I hope isn’t a harbinger of what is going on here.
It was common practice to `work’ an unsalvageable patient for the `family's sake’. Sure, we knew the patient was already dead. And sometimes we’d simply call it in the field. But sometimes, particularly when the family wasn’t already aware their loved one was gone, we’d do what was called a `show code’. We went thru the motions, initiated CPR, even though we knew it was for naught.
It was thought to be less cruel than simply pronouncing someone dead on the scene. Although, honestly, I found the whole process to be distasteful, disingenuous, and dangerous.
We justified it, of course, in our own heads. There was always a chance for a miracle. And it really wasn’t within our authority to pronounce anyone dead (yet, we did it all the time). It was a way to pass the buck, buy time, and still be able to say we’d done all that we could.
When I watch these meetings today, I can’t help it. I get an eerie sense of Déjà vu.
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