We Have Been Warned

I know this is a subject people might term 'negative'. But you know, I see this as no different to the people in New Orleans who knew a Hurricane was coming, and had the means to leave (I'm not referring to the poor who couldn't)and yet they decided just to wait and worry, or not worry. If you're aware of an approaching storm, is that awareness negative? It's real. It's smart. It's key to our survival. Turn your back on that level of consciousness at your own peril.
We need to be in the world saying, Look at that. What can we do?

There are actually still people in New Orleans, a place with no sanitary water, no electricity, no food, who think there is no threat from the sickening waters around them. Even after all that has happened, they are still sleepwalking into the future. I'm chagrined to say, this trend is everywhere, and in every country.

I think we live in a time where we never have to look over our shoulder because of the threat of a predator. It's been an ultra convenient, an ultra easy life for those of us who could afford it.
But you know, I've been out on safari in Africa, and it's a strange, exhilarating experience to be out in the wild, and you have to look around, not just out of idle curiosity, or following eye candy or flashing lights. You look around because there could be any one of a number of wild animals out there, that could harm, even kill you. Yes, it's unlikely. But you know, instinctively, you have to be careful. The tracks in the white sand at your feet say that a hyena stood where you stood a few minutes ago. The grunts of a hippo tell you a hippo is not far away. More people die from hippo attacks, in Africa, than are killed by any other animal.

http://www.southafrica-travel.net/Tiere/e_flupf.htm:
Hippos are the most feared animals in southern Africa. Each year more people are killed by them than by all the other animals together.

What is the point of that snippet of information? It's that we are now dumb enough as a society to not really appreciate the risks to our survival any more. We've even forgotten how to eat in a healthy way.

So how can we possibly have any idea of what's coming? First of all, we need to start looking around. Lift our heads from our cellphones, glance away from the TV and ask ourselves, Are We Really In Any Danger?

H5N1 is like a Hurricane, Category 5, headed our way. About the size of Australia. We can't get out of its way, but we can stock up our local hospitals with vaccines. Many countries appear to be wanting to just ride out the storm, but really, they probably aren't even aware that there is a storm.

We have been warned, and what's been done so far is not enough.

Bird flu pandemic a question of when, not if -WHO
07 Sep 2005 14:07:59 GMT

Source: Reuters

COLOMBO, Sept 7 (Reuters) - The world is going to face a pandemic of the bird flu strain lethal to humans and Thailand is the only nation in South and Southeast Asia ready to deal with it, the World Health Organization (WHO) warned on Wednesday.

WHO officials said the virus could mutate into a form that could pass easily from one human to another, making it easier for it to spread rapidly across great distances and kill between one million and seven million people worldwide.

"We may be at almost the last stage before the pandemic virus may emerge," Dr. Jai P. Narain, Director of WHO's communicable diseases department told a news conference on the sidelines of a Southeast Asia health summit in the Sri Lankan capital.