After we return to normalcy and hopefully soon, we will need to take steps to avoid the next pandemic. If we don’t come up with contingency plans that will contain future outbreaks, we will be forced to relive the insanity that we are now experiencing because of unpreparedness.
These are my suggestions:
- The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the rest of our intelligence community, who failed to protect us from this pandemic, need to be watching the rest of the world for future outbreaks like the Wuhan Virus.
- The Center for Disease Control (CDC), which also failed to be prepared for this pandemic, needs to work closely with the CIA to begin an analysis of any new virus to identify how it is transmitted and how it can be contained.
- When an outbreak is found, all travel to and from the affected area needs to be banned immediately until we know the extent of the outbreak.
- Our borders and all points of entry to the United States need to be completely secure.
- Illegal entry into the United States needs to be treated as a felony. Individuals entering the United States illegally must be detained, quarantined, and returned to their country of origin. Repeat offenders should be incarcerated.
- Legal immigration should include extensive physical examinations for possible diseases that can affect the general population. Individuals with diseases that could create a pandemic should be isolated until they are no longer a threat to the rest of the population.
- Should outbreaks occur in the United States, the CDC needs to have protocols in place for immediately testing people in the affected area to identify those who can spread the contagion. Those at risk of spreading the contagion need to be isolated until it is safe for them to return to the community.
- Travel in and out of infected areas will be immediately suspended until the danger has passed.
- All people in infected areas need to begin wearing PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) when in public.
- People in infected areas need to enter all buildings (i.e. schools, workplaces, stores, restaurants, and entertainment areas) by first using hand sanitizers before removing their PPE. (For those of you who have been on a cruise, the use of hand sanitizers has been a practice in all cruise ship dining areas.)
- The CDC needs to be proactive in finding vaccines and medications to protect the population for strains of viruses that have been identified.
- Every state needs to have mobile hospitals that can be immediately deployed where needed. The number of these hospitals should be based on the population of each state.
- Supplies of PPE should be available in stores so that they can be purchased.
I welcome any suggestions to make sure we are fully prepared.