State of Emergency

Friday evening President Obama declared a Federal State of Emergency in response to the Swine Flu epidemic. The White House said the declaration was a “preemptive move designed to make decisions easier when they need to be made”. This sounds rather innocuous on face value, but what exactly does being in a “State of Emergency” mean on a federal level? Also, preventions taken on our behalf only make the Administration look like they're on top of their game in regards to Swine Flu, so why are they burying this story by making the declaration on a Friday night and issuing a press release on a Saturday morning? For those who don't follow politics, this is a move that's reserved for stories that someone is intentionally trying to bury. This alone has me feeling good and skeptic, so let's see if we can figure out what they're really up to.

So what does declaring a state of emergency mean exactly? Personally, my worst fear is a suspension of Habeas Corpus which is legally allowed during a state of emergency as well as a right to a grand jury for members of the National Guard when in actual service. I don't think we need to look to such dire extremes in this case, however. Well, not yet anyway. I believe this is nothing more than another in a long line of power plays to increase the size of government, and allow for more power in the hands of a few. This marks the second time that Health and Human Services chief Kathleen Sebelius has had her powers increased by federal decree. On April 26th Swine Flu was declared a national health emergency and the government was freed up to move 12 million doses of antiviral medications from government stockpiles to be moved around to different states. At the time there were only 20 confirmed cases of Swine Flu in the country. Now with the state of emergency declared:

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius now has authority to bypass federal rules when opening alternative care sites, such as offsite hospital centers at schools or community centers if hospitals seek permission.
Some hospitals have opened drive-thrus and drive-up tent clinics to screen and treat swine flu patients. The idea is to keep infectious people out of regular emergency rooms and away from other sick patients.

Hospitals could modify patient rules — for example, requiring them to give less information during a hectic time — to quicken access to treatment, with government approval, under the declaration.

~PHILIP ELLIOTT, Associated Press Writer

So the president gets more power, the HHS director gets more power and more funding, and any sort of sabotage to our medical system can now take place with less oversight. In the mean time, health care reform is the most pressing issue being debated in our country. I find it somewhat hard to believe that the same government that is going to such extremes now for our better health was once the same government that had no interest in sealing our southern border and screening people on international flights when something could have actually been done to prevent an epidemic.

But what of the actual bug causing all this commotion? Swine Flu is nothing more then a more communicable, less virulent strain of the seasonal flu. Swine Flu only has caused the death of 1000 Americans this year. While that may sound like a lot, keep in mind that that every year 250,000 – 500,000 people die from the seasonal flu. This hardly warrants getting all worked up over - that is unless your goals were to increase your own power and the size of your government and aid the passing of your health care legislation.

If numbers aren't your thing, try and think of it this way: picture a football stadium filled to capacity. The average for an NFL team is 50,000 spectators so your home team's stadium will work fine for this example. Now if everyone in that stadium had the 1918 flu, which was a level 5 pandemic that had a mortality rate of 2%, 1000 people wouldn't survive it. That pandemic was responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of people world wide. Now how about the average run of the mill seasonal flu? With a mortality rate of approximately 0.1% you'd be looking at 50 people not surviving that infection. Now let's look at the much maligned Swine Flu. Even with great disagreement on the actual mortality rate (ranging from 0.007% - 0.045%) you'd only see 3-22 people die in the stadium. That's all. This is hardly worth all the fuss that the government has been stirring up, unless you get something out of it.

One thing worth noting: Out of the 250,000 – 500,000 that die every year from the seasonal flu, the CDC reports that only around 20,000 are Americans. That puts our actual mortality rate closer to 0.07%, meaning that in our stadium we'd have 35 deaths instead of the 50 the rest of the world averages. I guess there is something to be said for our current health care system.

Sources:

http://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/recommendations.htm

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/10/21/cbsnews_investigates/main5404829.shtml

http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/RS21024.pdf

http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/6216.pdf

http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSTRE58E6NZ20090917

http://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory?id=8590433

http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol12no01/05-0979.htm