# 269
Two Hundred and sixty-eight essays ago, I began this blog with very low expectations. I’ll save my critics the trouble, and remove the easy shot from the table by admitting that I’ve nearly managed to meet them.
Originally, I intended this place to be a virtual diary: a chronicle of the run up to a potential pandemic, recording the events, and my reactions to those events. I think best (obviously, a relative measure) when I write. It forces me to analyze my thoughts, and once I put them to paper (or electrons), I then `own’ them. So in many ways, I’ve used this blog as a method of personal exploration of how I would deal with a pandemic, should it come.
I never bothered to advertise this site, never promoted it. Up until a few months ago, most of the members of the flu forums where I hang my hat were unaware of its existence. It was my semi-private mental playground, where I worked out problems, and hopefully solutions, on a cyber notepad. I had hopes it would inspire some of my friends, and family to take the pandemic threat seriously, but beyond that, expected nothing more.
Over the summer, I occasionally received an email from the link on the sidebar. Someone would find this site by accident, and take the time to drop a line. It didn’t happen often, but it was very gratifying when it did.
In November, curiosity got the better of me, and I added a site meter. This tells me how many times each day my blog is visited, and most of the time, the location of the visitor. I did it on a whim, and expected to find a half dozen or so hits a day.
So you can imagine my surprise at discovering that several thousand times a month, someone logs on to see what I’ve posted. By most Internet standards, my readership is admittedly small. Barely significant. Probably no more than a couple of hundred hardcore regulars, who visit several times each week. Some show up several times a day.
As remarkable as that is, even more astounding is who is visiting this site on a nearly daily basis. My site meter software can identify about 2/3rds of the ISP’s. Most of the time, all I know are the city and country of the visitor. But often the domain name tells me more.
No, I won’t identify my readers.
But I will tell you that they hail from more than 20 countries around the globe. The domains include governmental agencies both here in the United States and abroad, along with International Alphabet organizations everyone would recognize. Major hospitals and medical centers regularly check in, as do financial corporations, banks, and consulting firms. I’ve also received correspondence from doctors, nurses, EMT's, and firefighters who visit here on occasion.
Why would any of them be interested in the views of a middle aged retired paramedic? One that admittedly is not an expert in virology, or any other scientific specialty? What can I bring to the table? After all, I have no special insight; beyond my interest in the subject and a propensity to read everything I can get my hands on regarding avian flu.
Here, I can only guess.
There are, after all, better `breaking news’ sites out there. I rarely jump on a news story, because the odds are, the early reporting will be wrong. For pure science, the Reveres’ over at Effect Measure can run circles around me. And Monotreme over at PFI is far more likely to come up with a controversial, though plausible theory, for the evolution of the virus. SophiaZoe’s blog is often more insightful than mine. And Crof’s blog has far more resources for the reader.
In fact, each blogger on the subject seems to have developed their own special nitch, and I make it a point to visit as many of them as I can every day.
While news and science and theories are important, each of us is struggling to make sense of what a pandemic would really mean; to our families, our communities, and to the world. None of us really knows, of course. The best we can do is run scenarios through our heads and see what `feels’ right. Basically that’s what I do here, pretty much on a daily basis, often in a messy and convoluted fashion.
I believe we all want, as much as possible, to figure out how we would deal with a pandemic should one erupt. And that has been, and will continue to be, the focus of this blog. That wasn’t the original intention, of course; but that is how it turned out.
None of this is to suggest that my choices will be the correct choices for anyone else. Or even that there is any `right’ course of action. Obviously there is no one-size-fits-all solution. But I suspect others find value in watching me struggle with the issues before us. My readers have seen me angry, skeptical, frustrated, and some days, even hopeful. Probably mimicking the same gamut of emotions that they too have felt along this journey.
All of this is a moving target. As we learn more, or discover we know less than we thought, our perceptions change. As an example, I'm far less critical today of HCW's (Health Care Workers) who might choose to refuse to work in a pandemic than I was a year ago. I don't particularly like that decision, but I do understand it. Exploring the potential of a pandemic is an evolutionary process.
Admittedly, I’m looking for solutions. Neighborhood flu centers, home made isolation units, oral rehydration solutions . . . anything the average person without an abundance of money can do to mitigate the effects of a pandemic for their family and their community. I actually believe that these sorts of things can, and do work.
In the coming year, I hope to provide more of these sorts of solutions.
As I write this, here on the east coast of the United States, the New Year is about 13 hours away. I pray that 2007 will not bring a pandemic, and sincerely hope that this time next year we are dealing with the critics who will once again ridicule our concerns. That would be a small price to pay for avoiding a pandemic.
But I also know that ignoring a threat doesn’t make it go away. It only leaves you unprepared to deal with it, if it comes.
To all of my readers (and even those who aren’t), I wish you a joyful, prosperous, and pandemic-free 2007.
And, Oh yes.
Thank you for your visits, your comments, and your emails.
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