Here is a brief excerpt from the piece I am writing on avian flu:
…these policy recommendations go against the U.S. national character. They will not strike an intuitive chord of approval from all quarters. America typically responds to challenges by refusing to admit it can fail. We have a “can-do” mentality. We built the first atomic bomb, we put a man on the moon, we revitalized the American economy in the 1980s and 1990s, and so on. This trait is admirable and it has been responsible for much of our national greatness. Nonetheless it may hinder our progress in fighting avian flu. We tend to seek out options which offer some option, however unlikely, of apparent invulnerability. Our approach should be different. We should be admitting that at this point we cannot stop a terrible event but we can only make it somewhat less bad.
For an example of our national tendency, consider the response to Hurricane Katrina. It was immediately decided that we should rebuild New Orleans as much as possible. I am not questioning whether this is a wise decision; maybe yes, maybe no. The point is we made this decision for reasons of emotion and temperament, rather than wisdom. We refused to admit that a major American city would be wiped out by a mere act of nature. So we engaged in a large macro response, designed to overturn or reverse the initial calamity altogether. This way we do not have to admit defeat, at least not yet. We seek to control problems when we cannot. All human beings have this tendency, but it is perhaps strongest in the United States, due to our long record of exceptional achievement.
Such a tendency could influence avian flu policy in damaging ways. For instance systematic stockpiles, centrally directed, and military-directed quarantines both give the impression that we can control the course of the pandemic. We would be making a highly symbolic and visual stand of “We won’t just let this happen.” Nonetheless these are not the most effective measures. Preparing emergency rooms or instructing people to wash their hands is, in effect, admitting that the disease would spread and kill people. It is a partial admission of “defeat.” Yet we might need some national modesty to address the problem in a relatively effective manner.
Consider, however, that our response to Katrina is that we will rebuild. We knew that there was no stopping it, and that people would die. If we’d known that a Category 5 storm would hit NO dead-on a year or two earlier, we probably would have tried to reinforce the levees, etc., in time to prevent flooding the city.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see, in the wake of this year’s avian flu, a significant effort to try to meliorate the conditions which launch new flu strains on the world every year or so.
This phrasing is awkward:
“We tend to seek out options which offer some option . . . ”
sounds repitively redundant over and over
Excellent post.
We see this in the hyperbolic media critism after every hurricane this
year.
The expectations, especially as amplified by the media, are that even with
extremely potent natural disasters, that we should be able to bounce back
instantly. With hurricane Wilma, for instance, there was this criticism
that people (gasp!) actually had to wait a finite amount of time for power
to be restored, or to get gasoline at a gas station. When other countries
lose thousands upon thousands in their natural disasters, we tend to carp
if people are merely inconvenienced by sweating and waiting.
A great politician once said “If you vote for me, all of your wildest dreams will come true.” That politician won his election.
Nathan: While I agree with some of what you wrote, and am at least understanding of much of your other comments, when you state “I’ve put the threat of a flu pandemic up there with razors in apples” you cross over into being ridiculously wrong and uninformed.
I don’t fault you for not being a medical doctor with the background to understand this issue entirely, but it should be clear why we must act now with this.
First, there is the reality of the spread of avian flu.
Second, there is the reality that the last time a flu pandemic hit it was prefaced by an outbreak of avian flu; in other words, the avian flu mutated into one harmful to humans.
Put those two together and you begin to understand why everyone is taking this very seriously.
By your reasoning we should never worry about a problem until it becomes a full bore crisis. Remember, before Katrina, everyone thought a Cat 5 hurricane hitting New Orleans and then the levies failing as “up there with razors in apples.” Before 9-11, everyone thought that the idea of terrorists hijacking planes and then using those planes as missiles was “up there with razors in apples.”
It is ironic, though, that if we act on this flu issue and prevent a pandemic, unfortunately very little credit will be given. Credit is never given for a crisis or problem averted; only blame is passed out very generously for a crisis or problem that does hit.
Nathan: You make some very good points. I too always fear too much of a power grab for any govt.
However, the real problem with managing risk is dealing with the uncertainty. In other words, we can’t know the future with any certainty, and so the best we can do is act on our best knowledge and science. To further complicate matters, once we embark on a specific historical course, we can never know for sure what the alternative histories would have been like.
We surely don’t know that this avian flu outbreak will result in a pandemic, only that it could. Most health professionals do expect there to be a flu pandemic sometime in this century, if not this current avian flu outbreak. So any planning for this flu can be transferred to other situations.
Sure this may be overreaction. But there are enough medical professionals warning us to make me think this is a valid reaction. And I would certainly err on the side of caution. Not to do something and to have a pandemic hit will be far worse than taking precautions and having no pandemic. Your nightmare scenario of military intervention, etc, has the possibility of materializing only if there is no forethought or “pre-emptive strike” against this threat.
You also write that “Our national character is weakening. You cannot count on you fellow citizens to behave as well as in the past.
“While there has always been looting in the wake of a disaster, I don’t believe that we’ve ever had national gangs move in in such an organized fashion.”
I have to respectfully disagree with that. Our national character has shown itself to be quite fine, whether in the reaction to 9-11 or Katrina. The vast majority of our citizens have behaved in very generous and noble ways. I don’t believe the looting after Katrina was in any way this fantastically organized effort, led by national gangs. I think it was what looting always is: a relatively few bad actors on the local scene. I didn’t detect any hint that this was so much more sophisticated a crime operation, only that it garnered more real time press reporting. But the people I saw looting on TV weren’t exactly supercriminals in some vast underworld operation.
Because we can’t know alternative histories, the reality is this: if we are successful in our planning to prevent or at least contain a global flu pandemic, the odds are that very few will give credit for our foresight. The only reward will be that life will go on as we know it and it will seem to some that fears of a pandemic are overblown.
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