Keep all real news, all true threats, quiet. Shhhhh- Don't warn the people and have them all upset and screaming. Just be quiet until it's too late, and until nothing can be done, then say "Oh dear! We had no idea! So sorry we didn't see this coming!" Riiiiight. But that's how it will go.

Due to my own medical emergency I spent seven hours in an ER this evening and night. What did I come home with? Only the good Lord knows! They are now asking if people have been out of the country in the past twenty days - that's a good thing.

I had been admitted to the hospital, meant to stay for a few days. They drew a great deal of blood for specialized cultures, then started an IV antibiotic. I wondered what was taking so long to move me upstairs, when the first IV bag emptied and they installed a new one of a different antibiotic.

The hospitalist came in to talk with me. Seems things have been crazy there for the past three weeks - all kinds of strange things - odd ailments, odd combinations of things, and they would move me upstairs as soon as they could find a bed for me. I specifically asked if the busy-ness had to do with like a flu epidemic or something. Nope. Not at all, just all kinds of crazy things.

I could hear a very drunk teenage boy screaming like a little girl, then growling, then groaning like a old, old man trying to pass a BM. He needs to have his behind kicked and be on restriction until he's thirty-five. Another man kept yelling for a nurse - believe me the nurses were flying up and down the hall trying to keep up with all the patients and their needs and doctor's requests. He said things like "I'm in pain here! Doesn't anybody care? I'm in pain!" Well, bubba, I wanted to say - my pain is likely worse than yours and you don't hear me acting the fool! So interesting to people watch and people listen.

The hospitalist gave me a choice - stay til they found a bed for me, or go home. If I chose to go home, I have to pick up two more antibiotics tomorrow, watch carefully, see my doctor as needed, and then gave me her name and schedule. If I need to return, meaning if the condition worsens, she will admit me and find me a bed.

So, what did I come home with? Well, less than I went with, I certainly hope, after all the IV fluids carrying antibiotics. Yet what was around me? I have no idea. People in ERs are not typically chatty, being too miserable for sociability. What had gone upstairs over the past three weeks and left a calling card somewhere? I typically stay far away from ERs because of all the bacteria hanging around there, and recently measles have been turning up in this area, whether that means measles, ebola, or both, we have yet to learn.

This event was an excellent reminder, with which I want to assault you into considering, that if the S had already H the F, what could I have done for emergency IV antibiotics? What could you have done? Can we manage such a full-scale assault with fish antibiotics? I don't think so.

My first recommendation is to buy actual medical supplies, whether from feed stores or medical supplies or however you can do it, and then try to make certain you have a health care professional on your team or at least within reach. Take your own supplies and ask her/his help in using them.

Second recommendation is to locate a health care professional and have something to offer him/her enough to convince the person to join with your group. Then ask what supplies he/she needs/wants, and how best to acquire them. I suggest the entire group contribute so that all considered necessary equipment and medications can be acquired for the entire group, through the professional. This is the ideal situation in my book. Well, second best to having already a doctor or other provider as a natural part of your group.

Where would I be right now, if the balloon had already gone up? My life at risk, a couple bottles of antibiotics tucked away that I would have to get out, not knowing if they were adequate to the specific infection, and prayed for the best outcome.

Considering that hygiene will be considerably more difficult after that time, we are all going to be at great risk of infection. The tiniest scratch or cut can be immediately contaminated and within a day or two become a raging infection, through hands not adequately washed, contact with dirty water, animal feces, your own feces if you are not attending to proper hygiene, every dirty thing imaginable. Those infections can quickly become almost anything, and I mean fatal illnesses - like staph, cellulitis, mersa, what's often called "blood poisoning".

Those who've said they are not very concerned about bathing should think about their words. Suppose climbing over a fence a nail or staple scratches you slightly through your jeans, on your leg or ankle. Or you step on a nail. A spider bites you. Your skin being already dirty allows that dirt and those germs to enter your flesh, your bloodstream. All because you didn't care much about personal hygiene. I hope you will think about this and rearrange your priorities into saving your own life.

So, that's my evening and my concerns and recommendations in a nutshell. Hope somebody takes it to heart - even one person - it will have been worthwhile.

My best to each of you.