What Do You Call it When a Four-Week Civil Contingency Exercise, to Prepare for a Flu Pandemic, Has to Be Cancelled Due to the Outbreak of a Flu Pandemic? A “Sheer Coincidence”
April 27th, 2009This was in the Scotsman last week: Rehearsal of Flu Pandemic Set to Begin:
A FOUR-WEEK exercise to prepare Scotland for a flu pandemic is to start next week, it was announced yesterday.
The Scottish Government will be running the emergency exercise, called Cauld Craw, involving health boards, the ambulance services and other organisations who will be key to managing a severe outbreak of flu.
For several years experts have warned it is only a matter of time before a flu pandemic arrives.
Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill said: “Although there has been no change to the level of risk of a flu pandemic, an outbreak has been identified as one of the main risks Scotland could face.
Exercise Cauld Craw will test how ready we are and help us strengthen our plans for the future.”
And now…
Via: Times Online:
Ms Sturgeon also disclosed today that Cauld Craw – a four-week civil contingency exercise involving hospitals, ambulance services and other agencies to prepare the country for an eventual flu pandemic had been delayed because of the swine flu outbreak.
She told the Good Morning Scotland programme that Cauld Craw – Scots for Cold Throat – had been due “by sheer coincidence” to start this morning. “Obviously that has now been suspended,” she said.
Research Credit: CS
Yey, it is a coincidence. Because those ppl who decide when and which exercise will be done are not the same as those who spread/design bogus viruses.
Most state officials on the front are just following orders and do no question what they see in (scientific) mass media. Thats not the problem here. What we should care about is the exact science behind the problem and solutions that care about causation and not symptoms. There is a real threat by letting humans and livestock living side by side within the same house; most diseases we have today are exactly because we domestized animals anyway. Those fervelas, slums and similar things are new to the biosphere and have the best breeding conditions for those diseases. Either we care about the poor and help them or such diseases will kill 2/3 by pandemic flu/plagues whatever. No wonder it happens in Mexico City, East Asia or in the most concentrated cities in Africa. We will never hear news about a spreading virus in mongolia or kasachstan. At least until somebody decides to plant something in those remote areas. But thats another story…
Oh, and as long as one MILLION humans croak because of malaria, i really don’t care about a flu killing some ten thousands.