disaster preparedness

Study: Public input can offer valuable insights during pandemic flu planning

kkrisberg | May 23, 2014

Despite our best preparedness efforts, a real-life flu pandemic would require some difficult and uncomfortable decisions. And perhaps the most uncomfortable will be deciding who among us gets priority access to our limited health care resources. How do we decide whose life is worth saving? There are so many different ways to view such a scenario; so many different values and ethical dilemmas to consider. In the chaos of a pandemic, life-saving allocation decisions would not only impact the patient in question — the repercussions would likely ripple throughout families and entire communities.…