Tag Archives: The Plague

Cassandra 2012

___ I’m feeling increasingly bleak about the human future going into 2012. I say this without the least pleasure because I have two small children (one is five, the other is eight). I don’t want anything I point to here … Continue reading

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I Got My Swine Flu Shot Today (and Albert Camus Would Have Gotten His Swine Flu Shot Too)

“No man is an island. Each is a part of the main.” This afternoon my wife, my three and five year old daughters, and I all went to the doctor to get our swine flu shots. We got our regular flu … Continue reading

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Read Albert Camus’s “The Plague” Ahead of Swine Flu (H1N1) Season?

Documentary filmmaker, John Pilger, recommends Albert Camus’s The Plague as a good read ahead of our upcoming pandemic swine flu (H1N1) season: A novel which tells the tale of the devastating plague visited on the Algerian town of Oran, it … Continue reading

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Iran’s Protesters and Two of Albert Camus’s Protagonists: Meursault and Dr. Rieux

I see characteristics of the brave Iranian protesters in two characters in Albert Camus’s novels. Meursault (the protagonist of The Stranger ) and Dr. Rieux (the protagonist of The Plague ) are both possessed of admirable heroic qualities. Rieux is … Continue reading

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How Dangerous is This New Strain of Swine Flu? Researchers Should Have a Clearer Idea by May 10, 2009

Today is May 1, 2009, and here’s what the AP is saying about H1N1 (the new strain of swine flu): Researchers will get a better idea of how dangerous this virus is over the next week to 10 days, said … Continue reading

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Swine Flu Quote of the Day

Dr. Margaret Chan, director-general of the World Health Organization emphasizes the dangers of virulent swine flu mutations and the need for ongoing vigilance: “For the first time in history we can track the evolution of a pandemic in real time. … Continue reading

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Tissues and Sanitizing Hand Wipes: Two Inexpensive Things That You Need to Buy and Use Now to Protect Yourself, and Your Family, from Swine Flu

According to the New York Times today, Britain has started a new ad campaign to slow the spread of Swine Flu: In Britain on Thursday, authorities launched an advertising campaign urging people to sneeze into tissues and to wash their … Continue reading

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How to Protect Yourself, And Your Family, from Getting or Spreading Swine Flu: Dr. Joe Bresee of the CDC’s Influenza Division

Accurate health information on Swine Flu from Dr. Joe Bresee (of the CDC’s Influenza Division):

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How Fast Can a Swine Flu Vaccine Be Made and Distributed?

According to Time magazine, four to six months: [E]ven if the CDC‘s seed stock of virus were to be released to vaccine makers today, it would take the companies anywhere from four to six months before the first inoculation could … Continue reading

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Swine Flu and Albert Camus: What You Should Do to Protect Not Just Yourself, But Others

Obsidian Wings recently invited a guest blog post on swine flu, co-written by an immunologist and bioethicist. The advice that they offered on swine flu amounted to a list of Albert Camus-like existential responsibilities that we have to one another in … Continue reading

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Swine Flu Quote of the Day

John Donne’s “Meditation 17″ in 1624:  “No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, … Continue reading

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Albert Camus on Religion

The French novelist of The Plague, in his The Myth of Sisyphus, wrote: There is only one religion that exists throughout all history, the belief in eternity. This belief is a deception.

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