Contagion: fact and fiction

September 10, 2011

The Minneapolis Star and Tribune interviewed Dr. Osterholm, the highly

respected epidemiologist and director of the Center for Infectious Disease

Research and Policy, and Dr. Ruth Lynfield, the Minnesota state epidemiologist

since 2007, about the fact and fiction of the movie Contagion. It isn't a very

long or comprehensive interview but still worth reading:

they did not think that the premise was scientifically unrealistic was

interesting as was Osterholm's comment about the unrealistic time line for

creating a vaccine.

I saw the movie last night and thought that some other parts were a little

unrealistic too. I thought it was very optimistic about the willingness of

public employees to go out in the streets and haul off dead bodies when they and

their families, like everyone else, were facing armed bands of panicked citizens

facing probable starvation due to the total absence of food on the store

shelves. In fact, to expect any public or private employees to do anything

work-related when their very survival and the survival of their families is

seriously threatened is unrealistic. I think that you can forget about almost

anyone going to work in a situation like this. You just have to make finding

food and avoiding all other people as your only priorities.

In the movie, the military attempted to provide food to the public in the form

of MREs, which predictably turned into a riot when they ran out. But in reality

the military would have to come up with (and distribute!) tens of millions of

MREs just to feed the public for one day - so far beyond possible as to make any

effort seem like an exercise in futility. In reality, I believe that the

military would keep their very limited food supplies to themselves and possibly

a select group of civilians that they deem vital post-apocalypse - maybe

scientists, technologists, and women of child-bearing age.

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