Z-Day: Are You Prepared?

I was catching up on some NPR Wait Wait Don't Tell Me and heard about this story. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has released a new emergency guide on their Preparedness and Response webpage and in their Public Health Matters Blog. The guide is called Social Media: Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse. The idea here being that if you are prepared for a zombie apocalypse then you are prepared for any emergency. Genius.

After a brief history of zombies the entry goes into general safety for when zombies (or hurricanes, pandemics, etc.) rise up. First, have an emergency kit in the house containing water (1 gal per person per day), food (non-perishables), medications, tools and supplies (utility knife, duct tape, battery powered radio, etc.), sanitation and hygiene products (bleach, soap, towels, etc.), clothing and bedding, important documents (driver's license, passport, birth certificate, etc.), and first aid supplies. Although, with that last one, you're a goner if a zombie bites you, but if you, let's say, cut yourself while boarding up your house against zombies then you'll be all set. Next, you should have an emergency plan. Identify all of the types of emergencies possible, besides and/or including zombie attacks. Know where to go and who to call when the zombies start lumbering down your street. Pick a rendezvous point (one close, one far) and identify emergency contacts. Plan your evacuation route. Despite being mostly brain dead, zombies are rather clever and definitely relentless when going after prey (you) and so you should not only know where to go but multiple, safe ways to get there. And finally, the CDC ends their post with a plea (well, I'm calling it a plea) for you to trust them to track the outbreak of the zombie infection and provide assistance. That is if they are not all zombies themselves.

Now that we're prepared how do we go about realistically (yeah, someones modeled it!)getting rid of the zombie plague? Go back to the short but informative Mmm...Brains! post from April of last year to find out.

Read the entire entry here:
http://www.bt.cdc.gov/socialmedia/zombies_blog.asp and http://blogs.cdc.gov/publichealthmatters/2011/05/preparedness-101-zombie-apocalypse/
and grab your own buttons, badges and widgets here: http://emergency.cdc.gov/socialmedia/zombies.asp

Also...
http://www.latimes.com/health/boostershots/la-heb-cdc-zombie-apocalypse-20110519,0,6704265.story
http://www.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/05/19/zombie.warning/index.html
http://www.naturalnews.com/032454_zombie_apocalypse_CDC.html
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=136500576