A Pox Upon Us Read online

  A Pox Upon Us

  Ron Foster

  Dixie, Alabama, USA

  © 2013 by Ron Foster

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN-13: 978-1483982854

  ISBN-10: 1483982858

  Printed in the United States of America.

  Acknowledgements

  Silver Fire Rocket stoves and Todd Albi

  SteriPen

  Heliatos Solar

  SUNRNR

  STOVETEC

  Taylor Brand Knives

  PurfiCup

  1

  Bug it in? Bug it out?

  The phone rang loudly and Dennis hesitantly picked it up thinking to himself “Well I know this is going to be bad news, but just how bad? As he fumbled with the receiver.

  “Hey! There you are Dennis! I am so glad I finally got through to you. The telephone lines have been crazy for days! “The familiar voice of his friend Suzy declared into his telephone handset.

  “It sure is great to hear from you my friend! Been missing hearing your voice. Are you ok? No problems?” Dennis queried while nodding at the rooms occupants this was the call he had been expecting. Suzy only lived about 50 miles from him but right now it could have been 500 miles as short as gas was getting.

  “I am doing fine I guess. I am just very worried as you might well expect. I can’t decide on whether or not I want to go hangout at the daughter’s house till this blows over, or come down to visit you and discuss SHTF plans. You got much company around?” Suzy asked wondering what house guests or otherwise might be listening to the call or might be taking up temporary residence at Dennis’s Prepper shack for safety and sustenance.

  “I got my Mom and as well as my good friend Charlene staying with me at the moment. Charlene brought down a bunch of her stash of preps for me to store and safeguard while she decides between staying here or maybe thinking possibly she is going to end up staying with her family one county over. You’re welcome to come on though and I will be glad to have you come and stay a short while or a long while. Are you maybe thinking about bugging in with me or is this just a social visit?” Dennis said hesitantly knowing his close lady friend Suzy had grandkids as well as extended family in her area and was probably pretty torn up as to what to do for herself or others in this situation. On the one hand she could help out with the kids babysitting etc as good grandmothers usually do but there were many options on the table. There were also a lot of cautions and survivability issues involved.

  Bugging out to her son in law and daughters house was one option. She would have to get out of her own neighborhood anyway she had decided one way or another anyway as the desirability of the neighbors company had gone way done over the years. That meant moving what preps she had managed to collect over the years on a fixed income to the house of a son in-law who had been dubious about prepping for anything and was pretty much unprepared for even a power outage.

  She and Dennis were pretty close friends that had thought and planned hypothetically in depth about several possible ends of the world scenarios together and they had both arrived at the conclusion that at their age having each others company and help when the SHTF was something both had strongly considered desirable.

  “I just don’t know what to do Dennis. I have a full tank of gas for the van; thank the lord so I can make the trip back and forth a few times if the roads stay open…” Suzy said speculatively while putting on a brave front and wanting to be with her dear friend but just stricken heartbroken at the thought of leaving her daughter and grandkids.

  “I can’t tell you much on making that hard decision Suzy. I heard Atlanta got hit with a terrorist smallpox release also and they are police backed emergency powers act restricting traffic into and out of the city at the moment. The CDC will be setting up various and sundry monitoring and observation points here and there as they try to contain the virus by clusters. You can still pretty much move around as much as you want at the moment, but you know there is no telling what the local police or sheriffs might get in their sometimes high handed minds. The roads all will be getting more and more dangerous to travel upon at a great many levels and even if you just needed help with a flat tire I doubt that many folks would stop to help anyone because of fear of contagion pr crazy folks. If you come to my place, you had maybe better pack for not going home again any time soon because the winds of change are coming faster than we can guess. Sort of what you call I.N.C.H. survival (I am Never Coming Home) mentality is what you might need to be thinking about when packing or traveling. “Dennis concluded cautiously before adding that we may not even see government enforced quarantine and travel restrictions this far south. Southerners tend to have enough sense to do it for themselves as need be and are kind of hard to be corralled if they don’t wish to be should someone tell them any different. Besides the threat was in the bigger cities up north, resources as well as perceived threats might not stretch down this far.

  “Do you think it’s safe for me to travel the highways down your way at the moment Dennis?” Suzy said willing to take the risk to see Dennis if not for one last time but also to maybe stay for the duration.

  “It’s about as safe now as it will ever be to travel about. I can only see things going downhill from here on and then it goes into the ditch from here on out as society unravels. Take the highway and if need be get off and hit the back roads like we talked about for safety in the past, but if your coming, you had better come on now and be sure to pack the last roll of toilet paper on the spindle in the bathroom” Dennis said not to sure he was giving the best advice, but telling her to close down her house.

  “Well I told my daughter and Son in law to come over today and pickup what preps I couldn’t fit in the van for my big move. They should be here at my house in about a half hour and then I can head out your way. Nobody’s been sick around here at the moment, in the family that is, but like you said some of the friends and neighbors are imagining or actually experiencing some ills or sicknesses” Suzy said thinking back on some of Dennis’s more high brow emergency manager academic teachings on what to expect out of people from this type of disaster scenario.

  One thing Dennis had brought up for this discussion many times is to be aware that not all physiological manifestations indicate exposure or are symptoms or indicators of a biological attack. Many stress-induced physical symptoms that mimic the effects of exposure are seen in first responders and the public as a whole.

  Of particular importance is a phenomenon studied called “multiple unexplained physical symptoms” (MUPS) that has been noted after disasters, criminal assault, and warfare. In addition to MUPS, there may also be emergent and maladaptive reactions involving groups of people (i.e., collective psychosocial reactions) in the aftermath of terrorism and large-scale public health emergency events, such as mass sociogenic illness (sometimes also called mass psychogenic illness or mass hysteria). Such illness is characterized by the acute and rapid spread of medically unexplained physical symptoms including dizziness, shortness of breath, nausea, and/or palpitations. These symptoms occur throughout a group of individuals, often through direct line of sight, in the absence of any substantiated toxic or microbiological exposure. The symptoms are associated with psychosocial stress, health-related anxiety and depression, all of which increase healthcare utilization. (Locke 2004)

  Bioterrorism threats fall into three categories: (1) bacterial (anthrax, plague, food borne pathogens); (2) viral (smallpox), and (3) toxins (botulinum toxin, Staph enterotoxin B, ricin, and Tricothecene mycotoxins.

  Basically you can arrange the symptoms like this:

  Severe flu-like illness indicating the release of inhalational anthrax, pneumonic plague, smallpox or other diseases

  • Flaccid muscle paralysis indicatin
g that a neurotoxin, such as botulism toxin, may have been released

  • Bleeding disorders indicating the use of a viral hemorrhagic fever agent

  • Rash indicating the release of smallpox

  • Apparent food-borne illnesses possibly indicating an intentional release on a food source or vendor

  Cholera Vomiting, headache, cramping, clear diarrhea

  Tularemia (AKA rabbit fever) Pneumonia and other symptoms 3 to 5 days; symptoms appear suddenly and powerfully (Fiedelholtz, 2003)

  Risk Mitigation

  Adequate stockpiles of broad spectrum antibiotics

  Vaccinations

  MOP suits

  Decontamination

  The suits and masks are very hot and heat exhaustion must be guarded against.

  Dennis answered her reservations rather carefully” I am not worried much about your bringing smallpox to my house at this stage of this mega disaster and please remind you to remind your family not to be freaking out about a little sniffle etc. from the kids. The power outage from that allegedly Korean and Iranian EMP attack will have been causing enough havoc already. That also means don’t stop for anyone darling to give a stranger a ride if your heading down the highway this way. People are already desperate enough, and you all keep yourselves a good eye on the neighbors when you’re loading your son in-laws truck with your leftover preps and food stuffs. You know them son of bitches in your neighborhood are going to be all over your house like a bait car in LA when they think you have moved out. Thing is get out and stay out of that neighborhood. I would rather have you staying with me but I understand if you want to stay with family. Just think it through as best you can.” Dennis told Suzy worriedly and tried not to look at the stares from his Mom and Charlene listening into his conversation.

  “I have thought it through Dennis, I think I could certainly help you more there than I can them here and I have already done what I can for them for now providing the extra preps.” Suzy said tearfully regretting such a decision had to even be thought about.

  “Well come on then Darling! Damn the torpedoes and full speed ahead! We will figure this thing out as we go, but be sure you’re not going to have any second thoughts or looking back on the way. I will get you reunited with them one day soon, I just can’t say exactly when or how at the moment. You be damn careful little lady and try picking me up on the CB radio when you get close enough. I will have “my ears on” and be waiting anxiously so try to call me when you leave if the phone lines let you.” Dennis said rubbing his head a bit dejectedly about how he was going to take in and care for one more member to his ever increasing brood.

  “Damn it, it was more about community responsibility and helping friends out now than worrying about stretching his personal supplies!” He mentally admonished himself.

  2

  Traveling the Byways

  "I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves, and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education."

   Thomas Jefferson, letter to William C. Jarvis, September 28, 1820

  The history of quarantines can be seen as a gradual expansion of the role of government to protect public health, first at a local level, then state, and finally at the Federal level.

  “Holy shit, what in the hell was that cop doing searching that car for drugs when it looked like the world was going to hell in a hand basket” Suzy wondered as she slowly made her way through a very small town mired with traffic on the way to Dennis’s prepper shack.

  “Darn, if I got pulled over now by them yahoos it would take them 99 forever’s to search through all the prepper crap I got in here and find nothing illegal except maybe the small-town L.E.O (law Enforcement Officer) fool would holler “open container” of alcohol from that left over Ancient Age whiskey jug Dennis had left last time they had partied together at her house. I guess I should of stayed on the main highway but this little law enforcement choke point would be damn interesting to talk to Dennis about when she got to his home.” She mused as she feigned non interest and avoided eye contact with the two camouflaged uniform men waving traffic on and off the three streetlights towns’ main drag.

  “Were those local cops, National Guard or what? Hard to tell these days.” she was thinking before shots rang out and pandemonium set in.

  Drivers in both lanes involuntarily flinched and speed up or slammed on brakes as their inclinations, instincts or stupidity took over.

  Suzy swerved to avoid rear ending a little old man in small maroon pickup truck who evidently thought you were supposed to “stop, duck and cover” under your steering wheel if gun shots were heard or mayhem was ensuing. Dodging him caused her to take the gravel shoulder of the road and scare the bejesus out of the increasing crowd of gawkers or possible objecting ill wishers that were observing the parade of cars and the strange arrest going on down the road.

  Suzy quickly regained her personal composure and regained control over her Van and hurried away from the unfolding scene in back of her. As she passed by the old wooden faded white painted clapboard Victorian houses along with the tiny family farms and left over share falling down sharecropper houses a statement Dennis had once made rang in her head.

  “Emergency Managers and Law Enforcement ultimately learn the wisdom of a simple adage: culture eats strategy for lunch.” Dennis had once remarked watching a YouTube video of a crowd overwhelming soldiers at a UN food drop.

  Dennis had told her to anticipate and expect wide spread civil disobedience as a precursor of a W.R.O.L situation (Without Rule Of Law) but she had never considered she would be experiencing first hand the manifestations of such. One thing was for sure, she was getting back on the highway as soon as she could. Screw these one lane, one traffic light towns, who knows if the county sheriff, the towns’ chief of police and the mayor was all on one page of control and conquer. She thought she would never consider it a good thing but bureaucracy and inaction in the bigger cities or disputes about L.E.O. jurisdictions seemed a good thing at the moment, at least which ones ineptitude might give her a chance to sneak by the legal or illegal patrols enforcing uninformed mandates by local officials. Damn Dennis in teaching me the acronym I.N.C.H, I ain`t never going to get home or see him at this rate. He was honest but seems to me he could have said more about that subject!” Suzy fumed to herself carefully watching the road.

  Following September 11, 2001, it became apparent to all manner of U.S. emergency responders that new plans for public safety responses were needed. Accordingly, health officials, at the CDC’s request, drafted the Model State Emergency Health Powers Act (MSEHPA). The purpose of the MSEHPA was to provide a resource for state, local and tribal governments to use in revising or updating public health statutes and administrative rules to ensure appropriate authority for implementing quarantine in the event of an emergency. States were encouraged to review their own laws, and make changes where necessary.

  The draft MSEHPA itself is controversial; critics believe that some of new powers proscribed in the legislation trample on the basic rights of citizens in times of emergency.

  Sue Blevins. “Heritage Lecture #748, The Model State Emergency Health Powers Act: An Assault on Civil Liberties in the Name of Homeland Security,” The Heritage Foundation, June 10, 2002.

  3

  Mind Your Gates

  “The Camptown ladies sing this song, / Doo-da, Doo-da / The Camptown racetrack's five miles long / Oh, de doo-da day / Goin' to run all night / Goin' to run all ...” Dennis heard a mixture of voices chorusing as he was trying to tweak on the engine of his weed eater with a roto tiller attachment on his back deck.

  “Well either that whiskey is fit for drinking that me and Charles have been working on making or that old son of a gun been holding out on me! “ Dennis thought as he saw Charles, Monica and her daughter Lorraine making their boisterous singing wee
bly wobbly way to his house.

  “That was the sound that there were some adult beverages involved in this impromptu party heading towards his house Dennis had no doubt. What bugged him was he didn’t see anyone carrying a jug to share with him. Dang those misfits I bet they drank up the first pour of that “Sugarized Sasquatch juice” that Charles and him had been creating and nick named. Hey that batch was only for trading and socializing with the customers first and then we got to partake of the profits. “Dennis thought gloomily about no booze for him or his back bistro as he called his porch deck.

  “What the hell is that? They got a radio playing jingle bells or something?” Dennis thought before he about fell out with laughter watching a giant cow sized bulldog of Charles topping the hill with a silly doggy grin and WEARING Xmas bells?” Dennis grinned while pondering the massive white and tan behemoth bulldog as it crested the hill in back of the seranaders

  “Oh hell NO! “ Now that is truly a sight! Dennis chuckled to himself as he managed to save himself from falling after tripping over a tree root watching the spectacle announcing itself at his end of the hill.