Let me get this straight. We have an outbreak of a flu that is as severe as a common cold and now the police have authority to use whatever force necessary to enter my home. Has the world gone mad? What is causing this hysteria and why?
http://www.care2.com/news/memb…
The Massachusetts Senate has unanimously passed a pandemic flu preparation bill that has languished in the Legislature before the recent swine flu outbreak.
The 36-0 vote today sends the measure to the House. Both branches have taken it up in past years, but have not been able to agree on the details.
The new Senate version would allow the public health commissioner – in a public health emergency – to close or evacuate buildings, enter private property for investigations, and quarantine individuals.
The bill specifically mandates the following:
(1) to require the owner or occupier of premises to permit entry into and investigation of the premises;
(2) to close, direct, and compel the evacuation of, or to decontaminate or cause to be decontaminated any building or facility, and to allow the reopening of the building or facility when the danger has ended;
(3) to decontaminate or cause to be decontaminated, or to destroy any material;
(4) to restrict or prohibit assemblages of persons;
(5) to require a health care facility to provide services or the use of its facility, or to transfer the management and supervision of the health care facility to the department or to a local public health authority;
(6) to control ingress to and egress from any stricken or threatened public area, and the movement of persons and materials within the area;
(7) to adopt and enforce measures to provide for the safe disposal of infectious waste and human remains, provided that religious, cultural, family, and individual beliefs of the deceased person shall be followed to the extent possible when disposing of human remains, whenever that may be done without endangering the public health;
(8) to procure, take immediate possession from any source, store, or distribute any anti-toxins, serums, vaccines, immunizing agents, antibiotics, and other pharmaceutical agents or medical supplies located within the commonwealth as may be necessary to respond to the emergency;
(9) to require in-state health care providers to assist in the performance of vaccination, treatment, examination, or testing of any individual as a condition of licensure, authorization, or the ability to continue to function as a health care provider in the commonwealth
Any person who knowingly violates an order of the commissioner or his or her designee, or of a local public health authority or its designee, given to effectuate the purposes of this subsection shall be punished by imprisonment for not more than 6 months, or by a fine of note more than one thousand dollars, or both.
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this week swine flu, last week craigslist killer, week before that pirates of doom. need I go on?
Pirates have been killing people for years off of Somalia, but they weren’t Americans. They’re still doing it, and it’s about time the American government and media dealt with it. If the media is feeling ambitious, they can deal with the equally bad piracy problem off the Straits of Malacca.
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p>The Craigslist thing was overblown, I agree. As for the flu…not sure yet.
Just saying that the media pushes fear. Some blasts from the past: Mooninites, MBTA hakksors, “Africanized-bees,” yada, yada, yada. People do get consumed and scared and run to the suburbs duck for cover… and 99% of the time these things are way overblown. When it’s not overblown? There’s either little we can do or the media treats the story with kid gloves — witness the handling of 9/11 and how the media let Bush lie to get this country in the wrong war — or the health insurance industry, which kills untold thousands of people every year, never mind wastes billions due to unnecessary fees and salaries paid to employees to dig up excuses not to provide legitimate care. That’s something to be afraid about — and the media’s almost always mum, or spreading those rediculous anything-but-Canada stories. So, yeah, how ’bout that Philipp Markoff? Better not use Craigslist, you could be attacked next!
As history has taught us, inaction is always the best course of action.
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p>Because everyone knows that Deval and Obama and Fidel are just waiting for the first outbreak of swine flu, rockin’ pneumonia, senioritis, or pennant fever so they can declare martial law, take your guns, seize your property, and force everyone into Marxist work camps.
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p>I mean, it makes sense right?
It seems to me that both the public’s response and the government’s response have been quite measured. No border closures, no quarantines, no orders for school closure, etc. I attribute this mostly to the good job the WHO and the CDC have been doing in terms of providing information about the outbreak to the public.
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p>Which of these statutory provisions do you object to in principle? Or do you think that they are all fine in principle but you worry about their misuse?
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p>TedF