Examining health and food issues, reporting deadly
government health policy, in the light of the Word of God

EDITOR:
Steve Van Nattan

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SARS

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome

Lancet Medical Journal from the UK reports that in China most deaths from SARS is among those over 60 years of age. Half of the over-sixties people infected with SARS die of the disease. The application: Older people must not take undue risks in nations where SARS is active. Older people should be self-quarantined from those they know, or suspect, have SARS. This does not mean those with SARS should be careless and cavalier about the illness.

The problem is that the window between infection and the onset of the symptoms is very dangerous to older people. They must avoid exposure to anyone suspected of being in that window stage, for they will still be walking about unaware they are dangerous. This was part of the reason the Black Plague was finally stopped-- well people avoided risk as well as most sick people.

May 3, 2003
This report comes from China. We are not able to leave up the identity of persons or locations for privacy reasons.

Since mid-March our city has cautiously watched cities where there is a SARS epidemic (Guangzhou, Hong Kong, Beijing). Within the last two weeks, many changes have taken place here. About half the population is wearing face masks on a daily basis, everywhere they go outdoors. There is a nationwide “clean-up” campaign on television, encouraging people to really pay attention to hygiene (washing hands, etc).

All public places have been scrubbed down and sprayed with disinfectant. One school class was interrupted by a worker coming in to spray the room (with what, we don’t know). During this May Day holiday weekend, NO student in our whole city was allowed out of their dormitory. In the kindergartens, primary and middle schools, if any child showed up with as much as a cough, they were sent home to be quarantined. In the complex where we live, there are new restrictions today. NO visitors are allowed in our compound, only residents. Panic is beginning to take hold and people are becoming irrational.

There were reports on TV that if a foreigner was seen coughing or exhibiting symptoms they would be taken immediately to a special hospital for foreigners to be quarantined for 2 weeks. All the schools are giving their teachers strict instructions: We are to have NO visitors in our homes; we must use a disinfectant given us to scrub down our whole house; we must wear a face mask at all times; we must report to the authorities daily with the health conditions of our whole family.

We are receiving new and added instructions daily. We don’t really have a clear understanding of the situation in our province because, as everywhere, the true conditions are not being reported. We heard from friends about a special vehicle which came and took away some people here and there. One of the women we know is an (-----------------) officer. She told us that there was a special meeting and that the situation in our province was going to worsen dramatically in the next few weeks.

The Chinese people as a whole are very superstitious and there are many rumors such as, if you smoke, the cigarette smoke will kill the virus. Many people who exhibit symptoms are afraid to go to the hospitals because they feel that it’s sure death for them. Because jobs are so hard to find here, there are millions of countryside workers in the big cities. If they get the disease, they will not go to the hospitals— instead, they flee back to their hometowns because they want to “die at home.” So, they are further spread the disease.

In (--------------), many people are adamant about their spouses staying home because they don’t want them in a crowd of people. Even if we got the disease, there is no way we would be allowed to leave the country to return to our home country for health care.

We pray that God would use this to turn people’s hearts to Him; that people would be saved and that we would be found faithful.

April 20, 2003
As of today, I have received regular reports from the World Health Organization on SARS. Though WHO has some spotty history as to getting things right with AIDS and other epidemics, they seem to be on top of this one and forcing the Chinese to tell the truth. Based on their findings, and the progress of the SARS epidemic, I must greatly reduce my expectations of danger from SARS for two reasons:

1. It is progressing very slowly, though it IS on the move worldwide.

2. It is killing maximum 5% of those who contract it. This is not nearly as fearful as E-bola or Cholera. Also, the reasons for death may include other factors, such as collateral infections and reduced immune systems of the victims.

Thus, let us be cautious, travel less to other nations, and simply watch the thing for now.

April 26,2003
Reuters reports: "A leading British virologist offered reassurance on Friday that the SARS virus was not infectious enough to cause a world pandemic. 'This virus is not highly infectious. It is a plodder like mumps, not a greyhound like measles,' said John Oxford, professor of virology at Queen Mary School of Medicine in London.

With a 'greyhound' virus, escaping infection is very difficult. But with plodder viruses, someone could walk 100 times into the same room as an infected person and still not be infected, he added in an interview. If the SARS virus was highly infectious, there would have been many more cases than the few thousand so far reported in China. 'I don't think there is any evidence of mutation,' he said.

Oxford, an expert on the influenza virus, said SARS should certainly not be compared with the Spanish influenza pandemic that killed millions after the end of the first world war in 1918. He said Chinese government measures, such as closing schools, to stop the virus spreading were 'very positive' but the situation outside South East Asia was different and did not require special containment measures…"

All suggestions on the page are not to be taken as professional medical observations by Steve Van Nattan. You should see your doctor at once if you believe you have SARS. It is NOT a shame to be sick with a very infectious disease, and SARS is not an STD. So, do NOT avoid identifying SARS in yourself or in your loved ones-- you could just make a lot more people sick, and the longer you put off treatment, the more chance you will die.

WHAT A FAMILY CAN DO

Based on what I am reading, and based on known precautions I have used and seen in Africa during epidemics, here is the best I can do to suggest a rational defense against infection by SARS:

About 3 to 5% of those who get SARS die of it. If you prefer to gamble, close this page and go on about your business. On the other hand, only 3% of the world population is 180,000,000. If we are looking at a world class pandemic, that is a pretty big group to risk joining at the mortuary. Fear is not our chief motive, but fear is a tool to teach us to avoid trouble. A smart little kid reaches out to touch the hot stove, feels the heat, and pulls back in fear. A stupid little kid has no fear, touches the stove, learns about hot things, and is disfigured for life. Fear is not to consume us, but it is a tool God uses to send us in the right direction.

1. Immune boosting herbs and diet

Start at once-- don't wait to use these commodities to boost your immune system.

Immune-Boosting Herbs Help your body resist illness with these immune-boosting herbs. This information is not intended as medical advice.
Herb	Symptom	Function	Side Effect	Delivery
Astragalus (Astragalus membranaceus)	Colds, viral infections	Boosts immunity, antiviral	None known	Capsules, tinctures, broths/soups
Codonopsis (Codonopsitis lanceolate)	Cough, congestion	Demulcent (sooths inflamed mucous membranes), expectorant	None known	Capsules, teas
Echinacea This is the herb of first choice (Echinacea purperea, E. angustifolia)	Colds, flu, cough, sore throat	Antiviral, antibacterial, boosts immunity, tonic	None known	Capsules, tinctures
Elder flower (Sambucus nigra)	Colds and flu, sore throat, sinus congestion	Boosts immunity, diaphoretic (promotes perspiration), tonic	None known (root is a strong purgative; should only be prescribed by expert herbalists)	Teas, tinctures
Eucalyptus (Eucalyptus globulus)	Bronchitis, cough, congestion	Antibacterial, antiviral, decongestant	Allergic reactions	Steam inhalation; topically applied as oil
Garlic (Allium sativum)	Colds and flu	Boosts immunity, antibacterial, antiviral, antifungal, tonic	None known	Capsules, powder, eating as food is best, raw or cooked
Gingerroot (Zingiber officinale)	Colds and flu, sore throat, sinus congestion, nausea	Boosts immunity, respiratory system tonic, diaphoretic, stomach soother	None known	Powder or root made into teas, baths
Goldenseal (Hydrastis canadensis)	Colds and flu, bacterial infections	Antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory	Strong GI astringent; use with caution in young children; endangered species	Tinctures, teas
Isatidis (Isatis tinctora)	Colds and flu	Antiviral, reduces swelling	None known	Capsules; works well with astragalus
Licorice (Glycyrrhiza glabra)	Sore throat	Reduces swelling expectorant, cough suppressant	Can cause sodium and water retention, loss of potassium	Tinctures, teas
Maitake mushroom (Grifola frondosa)	Colds and flu	Boosts immunity	None known	Powder; eat as food
Onion (Allium cepa)	Colds, flu	Boosts immunity, decongestant	None known	Powder; eating as food is best, raw or cooked
Osha root (Ligusticum porteri)	Colds and flu	Boosts immunity	None known; endangered species	Capsules
Peppermint (Mentha piperita)	Congestion, nausea associated with flu	Pain reliever, antispasmodic, stomach soother, antiviral, antibacterial, diaphoretic	None known	Teas
Sage (Salvia officinalis)	Colds and flu, fever	Stomach soother, reduces fever, antiseptic, antibacterial, anti-inflammatory	None known	Teas
Shiitake mushroom (Lentinula edodes)	Colds and flu	Boosts immunity, antiviral, antibacterial	None known	Powder, capsules, root extract, eat as food
Usnea (Usnea barbarata)	Colds and flu	Antibacterial, antifungal, antiviral	None known	Tinctures, often used with echinacea
White willow bark (Salix alba)	Colds and flu	Pain reliever, anti-inflammatory, reduces fever	None known	Teas, works well with cinchona bark
Yarrow (Achillea millefolium)	Colds and flu	Diaphoretic, expectorant, reduces fever	May cause contractions in pregnant women	Teas

Add pineapple and garlic to the diet also. Eat healthy food, and get exercise in the open where people are not milling around. Get plenty of rest. If you do catch SARS, you should be well rested so that you have some reserve. Do not be dieting during an epidemic. That can wait until later after the epidemic blows over.

2. Isolation of the family from infection potential

Stop wandering around. Around the world, around the state, and around the city where the mobs are.

Stop going to athletic events. No Disneyland and no traveling vacation. NO AIR TRAVEL. An airplane does NOT have filtration of air sufficient to remove viral organisms. I warned you of this long ago with regard to AIDS passed casually. Viruses are too small to be filtered, and you breath the air the others around you have breathed.

Stay away from hotels and motels. They may leave the lights on for you, but they reuse the blankets and bed spreads many times before washing. You are walking on, and sleeping in, the germ colony of all the visitors before you.

Take vacations or outings to places outdoors and where you are alone as much as possible. Go fishing.

Shop in 24 hours stores for groceries, and shop at about 3 AM. Mind your own business, and use the self checking out machine if possible. I like to have casual visits with people at WalMart and the grocery store, but during epidemics, this social practice just makes for risk-- to them and to you.

Wash everything you bring home, or spray or wipe it down with a cloth heavily dampened with water based Lysol (in the UK and Commonwealth, Detol).

Spray your shoes with aerosol Lysol when entering the home. Have a family member spray you down at the entry of the home, or outside, when returning from the market place where you may have been seated in public seating.

Stop eating out. This is a very high risk practice. Many eating establishments will be slow to let employees go who show signs of sickness because they will have to find a replacement.

If you enter an establishment where an employee is showing symptoms of SARS, leave at once and make other arrangements.

When the Post Office delivery person leaves you mail, wear latex gloves to handle it until you can spray it lightly with Lysol. Try not to spray letters which may contain a check you need. It can ruin it. You may want to leave the letter laying in the sun or a 140 degree oven for a couple hours before opening it. Beware of burning it up! When UPS delivers anything, spray the box with Lysol before opening it, and do not carry it leaning against you into the house.

You may want to make a disrobing area in the garage or, in the case of severe epidemic in your area, right outdoors. Take off all outer garments and drop them into a plastic bag with a shot of Lysol. Do this OUTSIDE the living area so that you can enter the home without contaminating it. If you ordinarily shower at the beginning of the day, move your shower time to right after coming home from work or the market place. Ideally, build a shower outside the home for those working with the public.

If possible, the bread winner should have a automobile used only for going to work. The family must not use this car. This way, the one taking the most risk can disinfect the car in a manner which he feels will best protect the family and reduce risk.

Choose ONE market to shop, and one area to shop, and do not wander to manner buying locations seeking bargains. This practice of multiple shopping destinations is the first line of defense used all over the world to contain epidemics. I trust you can figure out why.

If someone thinks you are stupid and mocks at you, just keep to your defensive protocols. You may read their obituary later.

If you pastor and local church leaders don't take the SARS issue seriously, stay away from church until the epidemic is over. You are not duty bound to attend a church which does not care who is sick and dangerous. Do not send you children to a church which takes no precautions. At church, greet verbally, and avoid physical touching and hand shaking. Church dinners and "pot lucks" should not be held during an epidemic. What social gatherings the church has should be close with no pressing new comers to attend. Rallies and events which "pack the house" are irresponsible of the leaders during an epidemic.

Public restrooms are dangerous. Try to plan trips to work and shop so that you can get home before you need to use the restroom. Otherwise, clean off everything with portable Lysol spray in small bottles. Also, do not wash your hands in such facilities. Carry a small bottle of alcohol gel, and squirt your hands and rub it in after leaving a restroom.

As you enter a store, a gathering, church service, or the work place pause and discreetly look around to see if someone is wheezing or dry coughing. Find something to make you look distracted as you reconnoiter. If you see a check out person who seems sick, or if someone in a gathering is clearly in trouble, either move to the opposite part of the room, or turn and walk out.

3. Stocking up, BEFORE the rush, on supplies

Surgical and allergy preventing masks are very important. You have seen them in the news in the Orient. Also, when shopping and handing money during a shopping trip, you should have latex or rubber gloves.

Try to shop once to last for two weeks or more. Shop in the largest stores so that there is a high ratio of air space to people present. Also, shop after midnight in all night grocery stores. Again, shop in the same stores-- Don't visit many stores.

If a town up the road has no reported SARS, you may want to shop there instead of nearby. Price is not the top priority during an epidemic. Also, head for the suburbs. City centers concentrate population, and so they also breed disease faster.

Avoid subways and city buses if possible. If you live in a city, a visit to a local small store would be much safer than a subway ride to WalMart. Subways and buses are deadly incubators of disease, and the sleaze of the city hang out there on cold nights.

Buy ahead on auto needs such as oil and parts you intend to replace.

If you get cash in change, spray it after you get home with Lysol.

4. Movement, School, and the Market Place

If you are in employment which heavily involves meeting the public, find another kind of work. If you can arrange to do your vocational duties when people are not in their offices or where you do your skill, do so now and set the pattern for the future. As SARS nears your community, or the community where you work, ask to take vacation you may have coming. Call in sick. Is it OK to lie? Yes, if it is life and death, and if employers are carelessly forcing people to work who are infected. No employer has the right to force his people to get sick and possibly die just so he can keep the cash flow up.

If you learn that SARS is in your kids' school, you must take your children home at once. Report the school to the health department is the school is slow responding to SARS. School officials are wimps about epidemics. They wait for several children to be seriously sick, and then they send the kids home. Levels of discussion and palaver have to take place in school setting before someone finally makes a decision. You may have to simply remove the child yourself. DO NOT TRUST OTHER PEOPLE TO PROTECT YOU FAMILY.

5. When infection is suspected

Do not hesitate to make an appointment to see the doctor. When you go to the doctor's office, if you are clearly having SARS symptoms, have a friend or family member register for you and wait outside. If you enter the waiting area, you could infect people. Also, PLEASE wear a mask to protect other. A sneeze or heavy cough travels across a room and back several times.

A family member who is sick should stay in a room of their own if possible. Anyone in the home who has a weak immune system, or older people with respiratory problems, may need to be moved to live with someone else for a while. When attending a sick person, down up, cover the head, use goggles, and a face mask and gloves. This has been found with SARS to be almost 100% effective in health care facilities.

Feel sick people on paper plates and throw away cups and plastic utensils. Discard them away from the rest of the family in sealed plastic bags. The sick person should ideally have their own restroom. If this will not work, they should have their own towels and washing things, including hand soap. Cavalier hicks who think it is cute to share tooth brushes and other toiletries will ALL pass SARS around to each other.

Treat this like a very serious cold of the flu. Stay in bed, drink fluids and fruit juice, eat soups and food which does not irritate the throat. If you have diarrhea, drink plenty of water to replace fluids. I am not reading about vomiting, but if this is present, drink more fluids. A dilute solution of Gator Aid might be in order since electrolytes may be lost. Other than this, call your doctor and ask what is needed for the patient. Try to deal with coughs with whatever soothing product works and with cough suppressants. Eucalyptus in a handkerchief is very helpful to clear the airways.

If breathing becomes labored, pneumonia may well be setting in. Go at once to the hospital emergency room for attention, for a respirator may be needed for a period of time. This is especially true with older adults and children with weak immune systems.

AIDS victims will need to go to the hospital as soon as the symptoms of SARS are evident, for they lack a complete immune system.

6. Eternity-- Are you ready?

Are you ready to die? Most people are not, and it is quite normal to NOT want to die. The problem with epidemics is that death comes closer and closer. The time to prepare to die is the same as the time to prepare to avoid the epidemic-- NOW! Both preparations are critical. If God has chosen for you to survive the epidemic, it may very well be because he has made you wise enough to avoid the epidemic. Fools will not prepare. God has also provided for your death.

Death comes sooner or later, and God, through the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, has provided for you to die without fear. By receiving the free gift of his salvation, you become immune to eternal damnation, and you receive the promise of eternal life with Jesus Christ. Now, if you would like to get SARS, do nothing to protect yourself. If you would like to go to hell and be eternally separated from God, do nothing about the Lord Jesus Christ. You will get your wish.

YE MUST BE BORN AGAIN

SEND MAIL if you need to talk about your eternal destiny.

7. Legal and financial considerations

Will your family be able to continue if you or someone else in the family die? Will your estate be thrown into probate? You should make arrangements for all names to be on all accounts and on titles to real estate.

You should make arrangements to name, in a will or such document, who will be receiving your children if both parents die. If not, your children will become wards of the court, and any atheist or sodomite could be assigned to your children.

You should seek to be either 100% in debt or 100% out of debt. If you are half and half, the courts will take one half to pay off the other when you go bankrupt.

8. Law and Order

Harry Truman said, "When you see ten troubles coming down the road, just wait a while, and nine of them will go into the ditch."

The potential for lawlessness during pandemics is very high. People become desperate, and they do things they ordinarily would not do in order to survive. You should look down the road as a family, and discern what lawlessness may come your way. You should take basic precautions for security of your home, and you should have in place weapons for self-defense. Then, pray that God will send the troubles you see coming into the ditch. Do not become panicked by the urgent and the unknown. Just keep your powder dry.

If the health department demands that you participate in a quarantine arrangement, do as they tell you. It is not fair for you to sneak around breaking the health principles. What makes you think you have a right to infect people because you think you have some civil right to wander around sick?

If a sick person in your neighborhood or work place is breaking quarantine, report them to the law enforcement people responsible for this sort of infraction. If you have no success in this, go home. If such people come around your home, or sick children try to entice your kids to play with them, you must do whatever necessary to prevent these lawless factions from endangering you.

If you see a sick person in the check out line, or working in a public area, report them to the health officials and the police.

9. After the crisis is over

Get back to normal as soon as you feel the epidemic is over. Continue to be aware that a second wave of disease could arrive in your area, but do not continue to live with all these precautions. The common cold can be avoided by using these precautions, but these protocols could make a real recluse of you if you maintain them indefinitely.

THE 2011 SITUATION

THE STORY

APRIL 2003 AND THEREAFTER

SARS:
DEFEND YOURSELF AND FAMILY

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