 Movie Poster for 2008 film, Quarantine |
By SHARON K. GILBERT
April 29, 2009
QUARANTINE. It’s a powerful word. Based on an old Italian (Venetian) word quarantena, it literally means ‘group of forty’. So, the word today can mean isolating someone or something for a period of 40 days. Sort of Biblical, isn’t it?
Generally, quarantines are used to protect healthy people, plants, animals, from those who are sick. Hospitals use ‘isolation’ as a means to protect uninfected patients and staff from contracting highly communicable diseases–and in reverse, isolation protects patients with compromised immune systems (such as burn victims or transplant recipients) from disease carried in by visitors.
Throughout history, governments, both locally and federally, have used quarantines as a means to curtail the spread of disease. If asked, most of us would prefer that severely contagious patients remain in their own homes or hospitalized if necessary. Most school districts require school children to ‘stay home’ if running a fever so as not to infect fellow students.
Voluntary isolation or quarantine can help cut infection rates. Voluntary.
But what if the government has the freedom to determine who is ill and who is not? What if that same government used such a determination to implement forced isolation? What if that government had the power to enter your home, school, or work place and remove you to a location of their choosing? What if they could shut down your business? Does any government have such power?
Yes.
The United States government does.
Executive Order 13295, signed by George W. Bush on April 4, 2003 amends the Public Health Service Act: [Emphasis mine]
THE WHITE HOUSE Office of the Press Secretary For Immediate Release April 4, 2003 EXECUTIVE ORDER – – – – – – – REVISED LIST OF QUARANTINABLE COMMUNICABLE DISEASES
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including section 361(b) of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 264(b)), it is hereby ordered as follows:
Section 1. Based upon the recommendation of the Secretary of Health and Human Services (the “Secretary”), in consultation with the Surgeon General, and for the purpose of specifying certain communicable diseases for regulations providing for the apprehension, detention, or conditional release of individuals to prevent the introduction, transmission, or spread of suspected communicable diseases, the following communicable diseases are hereby specified pursuant to section 361(b) of the Public Health Service Act:
(a) Cholera; Diphtheria; infectious Tuberculosis; Plague; Smallpox; Yellow Fever; and Viral Hemorrhagic Fevers (Lassa, Marburg, Ebola, Crimean-Congo, South American, and others not yet isolated or named).
(b) Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), which is a disease associated with fever and signs and symptoms of pneumonia or other respiratory illness, is transmitted from person to person predominantly by the aerosolized or droplet route, and, if spread in the population, would have severe public health consequences.
Sec. 2. The Secretary, in the Secretary’s discretion, shall determine whether a particular condition constitutes a communicable disease of the type specified in section 1 of this order.
Sec. 3. The functions of the President under sections 362 and 364(a) of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 265 and 267(a)) are assigned to the Secretary.
Sec. 4. This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit enforceable at law or equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, entities, officers, employees or agents, or any other person.
Sec. 5. Executive Order 12452 of December 22, 1983, is hereby revoked.
GEORGE W. BUSH THE WHITE HOUSE, April 4, 2003.
On April 1, 2005, President Bush signed an amendment to the above order as follows:
For Immediate Release Office of the Press Secretary April 1, 2005
Executive Order: Amendment to E.O. 13295 Relating to Certain Influenza Viruses and Quarantinable Communicable Diseases
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including section 361(b) of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 264(b)), it is hereby ordered as follows:
Section 1. Based upon the recommendation of the Secretary of Health and Human Services, in consultation with the Surgeon General, and for the purpose set forth in section 1 of Executive Order 13295 of April 4, 2003, section 1 of such order is amended by adding at the end thereof the following new subsection:
“(c) Influenza caused by novel or re-emergent influenza viruses that are causing, or have the potential to cause, a pandemic.”
Sec. 2. This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, entities, officers, employees or agents, or any other person.
GEORGE W. BUSH THE WHITE HOUSE,
April 1, 2005. http://www.whitehouse.gov
In March, 2007, this power to quarantine was tested on a plane load of passengers in Charlotte, NC. According to the CBS News report:
Health officials quarantined the Airbus A319 carrying 112 passengers and four crew members coming in from New Orleans, US Airways spokesman Morgan Durrant said.
Durrant said he could not confirm a TV report that the passenger was intoxicated.
The suspect passenger did not have smallpox. In fact, if you read the article, you’re left wondering why anyone ever thought he did!
Now–this morning–we read the following story at CBS News:
DHS Assistant Secretary Bridger McGaw circulated the swine flu memo, which was obtained by CBSNews.com, on Monday night. It says: “The Department of Justice has established legal federal authorities pertaining to the implementation of a quarantine and enforcement. Under approval from HHS, the Surgeon General has the authority to issue quarantines.” [All emphasis mine]
As of now, the spread of H1N1 is relatively sporadic, although seven countries report infections. Mortality rates in Mexico are at about 6% (if one uses public numbers). In the US, one infant has died so far. I’m not downplaying the severity of what ‘may happen’, but government response appears to be–at the very least–hyperbolic. ]
As we rush towards the eminent return of Christ Jesus, world events fall into line with prophecy. Disturbing trends in government control track uncomfortably close to God’s revelations to us in the Bible. Rumors persist of internment camps, and we know for certain that Halliburton’s subsidiary KBR received a $385M contract to build such camps for emergency use. This is an additional contract to previous agreements between ICE and KBR in 2000-2005.
Film and television are often used to introduce ‘memes’ into the public mind. On October 10, 2008, Screen Gems Pictures released a film called Quarantine. The plot centered around female reporter and cameraman who join a group of firefighters as they respond to a call from an apartment building. In typical ‘horror genre’ fashion, the ‘disease’ is spread quickly and violently, but what is most interesting is that the entire building is shut up, and no one is permitted to leave. Windows and doors are covered and locked from the outside, and the group’s cell phones are jammed. No one can escape.
Again, this sort of film takes what could be a realistic scenario and pumps it up into celluloid madness. But the kernel there is worth considering. If your child starts sneezing at school what might happen? If you cough at work, will you make it home?
During the Oliver North hearings, Rep. Jack Brooks tried to elicit information from Col. North regarding REX-84. Committee Chair, Daniel Inhoue, immediately stepped in and insisted ‘that matter not be touched upon’:
Jesus Christ is coming. “Are you ready? Seek Christ now. Tomorrow may be too late.
Your site is very interesting and especially seems to be nonpartisan. I have been hearing about the end of days since I was a little kid. During the Cold War, it was going to be all-out nuclear war between the U.S., USSR and China. During the early 1970s, pastors were saying that Henry Kissinger was the Anti-Christ (born of European blood, whispering in Nixon’s ear, etc.). I have heard it all, that the war in Lebanan two or three summers ago was the beginning of the end; when Iraq fired those scuds at Israel, I also braced for a big explosive all-out global war. In 2001, of course, I braced myself for all-out destructive war against the Middle East and conflagration that would pull in Iran and Isreal. It’s always scary out there in the world but I hold onto Christ’s words, that even the son does not know when his father is coming. Like a thief in the night, etc.
I love Christ and follow him to the best of my ability. War is scarier each year of my life. I just have to trust that God has it all in hand.
You point to legitimate fears of Rex-84, the Bush administration’s incredibly powerful destruction of civil liberties, Presidential Directive 51, which is real and says the president takes control and the nation is cut into six regions, each headed by a Homeland Security official; the head of Homeland Security rules over those six regions at the direction of the president. Congres and the Supreme Court are invited to participate with “comity,” which means by invitation of the president. There is no balance of power among three branches. Worse of all, the president can declare martial law if there’s a natural disaster, such as Katrina in New Orleans.
This is unprecedented and I can only pray that Obama cancels that particular directive to save our Democracy in times of trouble.
I absolutely hate George Bush, Cheney and the other nutcases who deemed themselves the arbiters of our freedom. If they are not enemies of the people, we don’t have any. I fear Repuhblican conservatives most of all. I worry not a whit about foreign powers. Republican conservatives still in Congress are the ones who will destroy our liberties if they’re given another chance.
I am a good American who loves liberty and despises autocratic torturers who will try to wrest control again and this time these evil people will bring America down.
I pray God destroys their efforts. Only we can keep them out by our votes. Palin, McConnell, Boehner, all of them are dangerous idealogues who must never gain power again.
john Guerra
Obama is George Bush jr. on steroids.