What would you do family wise, if there was a smallpox outbreak

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I'm just wondering, what I or others would do if there was a smallpox outbreak! I looked it up last night and most people under 27 yrs of age were never innoculated, those of us who are, their not sure how protected we are since the vaccination was given to us long ago. My dh was given the 1 as an infant then a booster in junior high, I remember you had to get another one like in 8th grade, my older sis had to get hers, but by the time I got there they had stopped the 2nd shot! Whew was I glad! Of course there are two types or more, but one is major and one is minor, the minor one is probably similiar to chickenpox, as in most people survive it, but the major one has a 30% fatatlity rate left unnassited by modern medicine such as antibiotics and such. At least thats what the site said I was reading. I don't feel like our goverment and the media is telling us the truth soon enough on the anthrax and such, but I do realize they're trying to prevent mass hysteria! My children are in public school and I think I would take them out if there was an outbreak and we wouldn't be going to Wal-Mart either. Yes, I realize this is letting the terrorist control or lives, but this is my childrens live also and I don't think I'm willing to take a chance with their health. Smallpox is spread by sneezing and coughing, your not usually contagious till you run fever, there is a 7-14 day incubation period after exposure.

-- Carol in Tx (cwaldrop@peoplescom.net), October 16, 2001

Answers

I know it is hard to know what to believe sometimes. WhenI send my kids off to school I am always telling them to wash their hands and not to touch anything they don't have to touch! I think the best thing we can do right now is just try to stay as healthy as possible and to use common sense when listening to the news reports.

-- Melissa (cmnorris@1st.net), October 16, 2001.

Well, this isn't about small pox but we had a concerned situation regarding Foot & Mouth last May. My husband works in the big city, for a HUGE, world wide company. He works in the office, but one day he had to go to the production floor and he noticed a large crate that had just been received from their sister company in England. At that time, (May) there were several cautions regarding F&M and travelling abroad. We raise dairy goats, so my husband became quite concerned and contacted his superior regarding the customs regulations and health precautions taken regarding this crate. His superior found it somewhat humorous and we were basically laughed at for our worries.

It amazes me that some people don't take health threats seriously. Had F&M come to our farm, not only would we have been devasted, but the disease (any disease for that matter) can spread like wild fire if one considers the several places we go and the amount of people that we come into contact with each and every day. Each day, I work closely with approximately 50 people. On the way home from work, I usually make at least 1 stop: drop off supper for Gramma, go to the post office or bank, stop at the grocery store, farm/feed store, doctor's office, I even deliver goat milk on the way home to a family of 7. People come to my farm to buy eggs, milk & other garden produce. The amount of contacts that we have is limitless and all it takes is one mistake to start a sickness. We must be careful and watch out for ourselves and our families.

-- Charleen in WNY (harperhill@eznet.net), October 16, 2001.


Hello Carol, The first thing I would do is to avoid contact with any one from town or that had been to town. The second thing I would do would be to make sure everything was as clean as possible on the homestead and keep it that way. Sincerely, Ernest

-- http://communities.msn.com/livingoffthelandintheozarks (espresso42@hotmail.com), October 16, 2001.

www.jama.ama-assn.org/issues/v28ln22/ffull/jst90000.html thats the site I got my info from. Pregnant women, immune compromised individuals, the young, the elderly and anyone under 27 is at greater risk.

-- Carol in Tx (cwaldrop@peoplescom.net), October 16, 2001.

In the event of an outbreak of smallpox in this country, the CDC would descend upon the site and any area within a 5 mile radius and begin vaccinating ALL folks who were not already infected. This is how smallpox was eradicated to begin with. Smallpox is an interesting disease because its' only resevoir is MAN. Person-to-person contact is the only way to spread smallpox. The folks in the CDC who are epidimiologists are terrific at their jobs. These folks can trace a single person all across the country when they have to, to chase after a contagious disease; if 50 people in Atlanta popped up with Smallpox, the epidimiologists would quarantine these folks and their contacts, vaccinating as they go from neighborhood to neighborhood. It is really something to see. I did a 5 month stint with them when I was in med school in the 70s..they traced 250 cases of syphillis, treating all the infected people until they found the source..they are like bloodhounds!!!!!! BTW, my grandmother who died in 1996 at the age of 94, had smallpox as a child..so did her mother and four siblings. The infant in the family died..great-grandma had a few scars from it and everybody else was fine. They lived in a log cabin in Nova Scotia..the one doc from the copper mines came out to see them twice...no antibiotics, no hospitals, no nurses....What would I do? Wait for the CDC and keep to my farm with my family..if other folks came by, we'd chat over the fence at a six feet distance.

-- lesley (martchas@bellsouth.net), October 18, 2001.


Wow doesn't look like anyone has looked at this site for a year now. The threat is very real, so real that the goverment in Isreal has made sure there people have been vacinated. Wonder why not here? I'm an RN working in a Emergency Room. I'm around people coughing and sneezing all the time. We just recently had a patient with TB. We have more people in our society today with poor immune systems that any virus is possible. Even one that has been erradicated. Smallpoxs isn't as much deadly as it is disfiguring. Most people die from secondary infections related to the illness. Today we have more and better healthcare and medications that would decrease that 30% mortality rate. But the question I pose, If were going to wait until an outbreak occurs, were do they think they will find the nursing personel, or healthcare workers to help control its spread.

-- Dana Sterner (DanaSterner@MYACTV.NET), October 15, 2002.

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