WATER
Water is another critical element of survival nursing. Great quantities of pure, wholesome water are required to hydrate patients, clean the retreat, and cook. Much of this must be hot water, suggesting yet another use for our already dwindling energy supplies.
Betty Lou developed a spring outside the city in which she usually works, but this technology is probably outside the scope of this book. But by whatever means, water supplies in a survival nursing situation must be dramatically expanded. It also calls for expansion of water-purifying systems.
It is best to plan for a bigger, better sand filtration rack, more bleach, and perhaps ever. some of the more expensive, faster acting water purification chemicals. Upping bleach use to 3 ounces per gallon, and/or allowing the mixture to sit 24 hours rather than 12 is workable. If survival nursing seems a possibility, lay in some 35-percent food-grade peroxide (which also stores relatively poorly). Have a supply of tetracycline hydroperiodide and titratable iodine tablets or even some plain old iodine tablets from your local pharmacy Check local pharmacies, mail-order preparedness people, or backpack supply outlets for these chemicals. All are quite expensive, limiting use to nursing candidates.
Using one of the popular little 1-quart-per-minute 2-micron backpack filters is also a possibility. They range in price from $60 to about $150. From 200 to 300 gallons of water can be purified before another $50 filter must be installed. Most retreaters run their water through the sand filter first. Cost, speed, and service life usually limit these devices to producing water for patients.
NUTRITION
What is the most important nursing element for patients recovering from burns, breaks, and gunshot trauma?
Most people are surprised to discover it is nutrition. My first guess was a good supply of antibiotics. I was skeptical, so I asked several experts. I heard the same story time after time. When survival nursing is likely, lay in a huge supply of high-quality multiple vitamins and minerals, I was repeatedly told. Along with antibiotics, some of these are available from the vet supply counter.
Plan to feed quality meals, they said. A surgeon suggested that I bone up on the five basic food groups. And they are not nicotine, caffeine, sugar, fat, and alcohol, he half-scolded with a twinkle in his eye.
Chicken soup’s restorative powers are apparently no myth. Patients respond mightily to nutrition, adding yet another dimension to our storage needs and requirements. Basically, good nutrition depends on lots of clean water, fruit, fresh vegetables, meat, and grains daily We are told to pay special attention that everything is prepared and served in the most sanitary manner possible. Improper food preparation can lead to a destruction of food value or, on the other end of the scale, to possible food poisoning.
We are to select one main course providing an adequate serving of meat. Bread or some sort of cereal should also be provided. Fruit and/or vegetables as available should be served at least once a day. Recovering patients may eat like hogs or they may eat like birds, including as many as five meals daily. A nurse’s duty is to keep the patient clean, happy, and full of good, nutritious food. Not an altogether easy task, especially in primitive conditions. This simple-sounding philosophical concept is often about as important as storage, diagnosis, and then deployment of pharmaceutical drugs.
MEDICAL CONDITIONS
As mentioned in Chapter 10, initial care is a complex issue about which a bit has already been written. Those interested in medical matters not directly having to do with long-term nursing might look at Survivalist’s Medicine Chest and Do-It-Yourself Medicine.
It is my firm conviction that survivors, including those in cities. are faced with three general categories of medical conditions. First of these are medical situations brought on by age, heredity, or general deterioration, over which we have little or no control and for which cures and effective treatments, in the hands of specialists, buy a few years at best.
Second are conditions directly caused by personal behavior which are completely avoidable. AIDS and lung cancer (for smokers) jump to mind as examples in this category. This is not to suggest that there are personal choices we should not make. Only that there are personal choices that all individuals must make knowing full well that the when they choose wrong, the consequences are severe.
Third are medical emergencies brought on by accidents, warfare, or environmental conditions that are definitely treatable by skilled, dedicated amateurs. These are the type of conditions where nursing is most effective. Obviously there is overlap. The challenge lies not in taking foolish, unrewarding risks. while still continuing at the same time to enjoy life to its fullest. Detonations and gunfire are an adrenaline rush for me, for instance. I already know I may not die in bed.
These last people who have consciously elected to get into the battle and are now hurt, who have contracted some awful disease or condition as a result of a filthy, unhealthy environment, or who have been abused by their fellow man are ones we can realistically expect to nurse back to life in our survival retreats.
I hope this brief introduction has sensitized all potential city survivors to the understanding that they will likely be faced with a survival nursing chore, what it will cost to undertake this chore, and how to proceed.
Conclusion
But will all of this stuff really work?
It’s a fair question with which I am frequently confronted—principally by skeptical, nonpreparedness folks who really don’t want it to work.
I’m thankful that most skeptics stay well outside the ranks of practicing survivalists. These skeptics are the types who fail to see any future need for any survival skills or knowledge. Planning ahead is the hallmark of the survivor. Obviously these are not plan-aheaders.
People who have actually lived through a collapsed, foughtover, or abandoned-city survival scenario all agree—most of us can make it.
Significantly, most survivors never want to repeat the experience. “Even a pig,” one especially devout Islamic Imam told me, “should not have to go through what I went through on our retreat from Delhi to Karachi.” His confession after 50 years was so solidly sincere it was virtually tearful.
Being certain that some sort of collapse will likely occur in one of our big cities is necessary if one is to survive. Jews in Europe immediately prior to World War II were convinced that nothing worse could happen to them. Few made real, viable preparations.
“They just could not do all of the monstrous things Hitler, Himmler, and Heydrich said they will do to us,” was their plaintive cry. They are like some foolish, appeasing American gun owners today whose motto seems to be, “If we do just this one more stupid, ineffective thing, they will finally leave us alone.”
When we were kids, we used to whistle as we walked past the cemetery at our property corner. How many wars, genocides, mass killings, and ethnic cleansings will it take before we realize that governments will never leave freedom-loving people alone?
All city survivors of any experience fervently wish they had taken the time and money to make more extensive prior preparations. It would have been much easier if they’d had a few more gallons of stored water, bags of flour, dollars to buy necessities, or whatever, they all say.