Swine Flu is not a Hoax

Here's a link to a piece I wrote that was in this weekend's Houston Chronicle. Although it is more from a public health perspective than a bioethics one, there's an aspect to disaster planning that I think should be of interest to us--which is the burden that falls to women because of the absolute lack of public health infra-structure. Who do you think has to take off of work when a school is closed or a family member is sick? How would any of us care for ourselves, our families, and our pets if we could not leave the house?
Although any infra-structure can be overwhelmed given a sufficient burden, we in the United States start in the postion: we have nothing to be overwhelmed.