Debate for school! Help please!
 

Hi how are you all doing? Im a senior in high shcool and i need to write a debate for a medical competition that I am in. The topic is... "The United States is effectively prepared to respond to a widespread biological disaster." I have to write that the U.S. is ready and that the U.S. is not ready. If you can just write down some ideas i'd appreciate it.
Thank you!
Alex

RE: Debate for school! Help please!
 

Uh, Alex . . .whyare you asking us?

RE: Debate for school! Help please!
 

I figured most of you are a little older then me and know about politics. Im just trying to get some input. I came in 3rd place already im just trying to be proactive and further the debate. My dads going to buy a new Zo6 pretty soon so most likely ill be on here a lot in the future! =-)

RE: Debate for school! Help please!
 

Well, okay, m two cents worth. But I doubt my thoughts are any news to you.

The topic is... "The United States is effectively prepared to respond to a widespread biological disaster."

Pro: we have a omnipresent and reasonably efficient medical system of hospitals, nurses, doctors and clinics with the best technology money can buy. We have the world's and history's, best communications and information systems, a national center for disease control, etc.It is always possible to hypothosize a pandemic (natural) or attack (unatural- terorist) that overwhelms us, but the fact is that there have been no pandemics for nearly a century, and several attempted biological attacks and terrorist incidents have shown biological terrorism is not as effective as books by Tom Clancy, etc., might suggest. Is there really any more threat than our system has proven it can handle in the past.
Thus, you have to ask what "reasonably efficient" means if not that we are prepared for anything that can reasonably happen, and haven't thrown money away on being prepared for fantasiesIt is possible to hyptohosize situations that would overwhelm our system, but there is not much evidence they are realistic: where is the proof - data, facts, that a real pandemic will occur that we cannot handle? Since modern medicine has been around (define this as, say, since WW I, antibiotics and all, polio, etc.) there has been nothing the world can throw at us we could not handle.
To spend money to prepare for nightmare situations that we can dream up -- science fiction -- that go far beyond anything that facts and decades of experience have taught us, is foolhardy -- it would divert it from issues of real and known importance -- geriatric medicne for our graying poulation, etc.

Con: Evolution is leading to more drug resistent and virulant diseases. It's only a matter of time (no doubt you already have great quotes from eminent scientists on this).Something like the flu pandemic of (what, early 1900s of so?) will happen again. This time exacerbated by fast travel (airplanes, shipping of food cross country,look what happened with e-coli -- spread all over the nation indays and it took us a week or two to determine what it was -- what what have happened if that have been an airborne pathogen and not lettuce or spinach borne.What in particular if this germ were helped by a little genetic engineering from, say, Iran or some other rebal state, with some 're-engineering" to make it really nasty (say, a very slow Ebola-- it would still be contagious as hell, unstopable because its a prion or whatever you call a sub-virus, and it would still kill you in a particularly messy, painful and gooey way,
but it would no longer kill you so quickly that you had little chance to spread the germs, etc.((Ebola is the nastiest disease I know of -- no cure and maybe not cureable at all, but it kills so quickly that you get to pass the disease on to only a few people before dying -- too few to make it ripply through a whole nation in a matter of a few weeks).

RE: Debate for school! Help please!
 

That was great Lee! Now what do you haveas a decisive conclusion?
All I can add is, cover your mouth when you cough! :D

RE: Debate for school! Help please!
 

I believe that one of the Pros that Lee brought up can actually has a Con to it. Yes we have thrown a lot of money into testing for various situation that may never happen, but if said situations where to come about will all that planning and practice really be executed the way the books where written. Its like the kid in the karate class that has the ability to do all the moves and katas perfectly but gets his ass kicked in a real world fight because of his lack of actual experience. Although it wasn't a biological outbreak the situation in New Orleans with Katrina is a perfect example of a system that was put into place to help when such disasters happen that completely fell apart when faced with a real world occurrence. I hope that just made sense...:(

RE: Debate for school! Help please!
 

Made sense to me, Pay. What an interesting thread!

RE: Debate for school! Help please!
 

Hey guys thanks for your help!! I really appreciate your input. Hopefully ill be asking you some questions soon for the Z06 like suggestions on intake, exhaust, rims, headers =-) Again thank you!

RE: Debate for school! Help please!
 

You have to admit guys, this is one very cool forum because we get things like this once in a while, too.

RE: Debate for school! Help please!
 

I'm finding, there to be, a plethera of intelect, on CF! :)