Pandemic illnesses are classed as a geometric acceleration of infections over a period of time where the illness has no treatment or is an unknown.
You get 1 person, then two, then four then 16 then 250 and you have a pandemic.
If it is fatal in just 50% of the cases there are a lot of dead people walking around that don't know they are spreading it and that they are dying.
Your best alternative is to stay away from people who have been in an area of infection. Stay indoors and if symptoms appear post it on the outside of doors and windows.
Good advice, SheepDog! Self-quarantine is always a good thing in a pandemic situation!
Please know that the disease does not have to be unknown or have no treatment to be considered a pandemic. An example of that is flu- there are treatments available, but in the event that the flu spread from continent to continent and infected large numbers of people, it is a pandemic! If pandemics were only spread using your numbers (1 infected becoming 2, then 2 becoming 4, etc), pandemics would be a lot easier to control. Unfortunately, though, the diseases that make it to pandemic status have a high attack rate (meaning the speed of spread in a susceptible population). They also tend to have a higher reproductive rate. That means the ill patient infects more than just one other person. Even if the disease causing the pandemic is treatable, with a high reproductive rate, the sheer number of people becoming ill would tax resources greatly, eventually overwhelming the system. When I wrote my organization's pandemic plan, I had to take into consideration things like loss of infrastructure due to people being too sick to come run the power plants, water systems, sewers, etc. I had to consider the loss of food supplies due to not enough available well people to transport supplies. Even the healthcare system is subject to losses of personnel due to illness..... not to mention inability to restock whatever drugs and supplies were necessary to treat patients.
I am not particularly worried about bubonic plague. It is endemic to my area (Arizona), found mostly in prairie dogs and other rodents, and is spread by fleas. With bubonic plague, the bacteria (
Yersinia pestis) invades the body's lymphatic system, causing lumps called buboes. The disease is treatable with antibiotics and supportive measures. Much more worrisome is septicemic plague and pneumonic plague- in septicemic plague, the
Y. pestis bacteria gets into the blood stream and can cause massive organ failure due to sepsis. It is treatable, but will consume a lot of resources. Pneumonic plague is also pretty serious, as the
Y. pestis invades the lungs. Again, treatable, but these people may wind up on ventilators and have impaired lung function if and when they recover.
I believe that a massive pandemic is just waiting to happen, and that our porous border will help facilitate that. Consider Ebola. The incubation period is anywhere from 2 to 21 days with the average being 8-10 days. So, if a susceptible person has an exposure to Ebola and in fact becomes infected, it can be up to 21 days before symptoms are apparent. The person is theoretically not contagious until symptoms appear, but initial symptoms are consistent with other diseases such as flu. How many of us wake up with a fever, headache, fatigue, diarrhea or stomach ache, and go to work anyway, planning to power through because it's just "a touch of the flu" or something we ate? Imagine someone in the very early stages of showing Ebola symptoms, walking around Walmart on a Saturday morning. It is supposedly spread by contact with blood and body fluids or through droplets (although I've read studies that give me reason to believe it may also be airborne to a degree). That one person could infect hundreds of people before major symptoms such as hemorrhage begin to show.
Other than avoiding Walmart, what can we do? Hand hygiene ranks at the top of the list. Being prepared to self-isolate for at least 2 months (or longer, depending on the disease and how it is spread) is another viable strategy. Having a good stock of medical grade gloves (non-sterile nitrile gloves would be my preference, as I think nitrile is better than vinyl) and masks would be another good thing. I would also recommend keeping a stock of disinfectants and disinfectant wipes available.
