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Letter Re: That Post Die-Off Fragrance

I have read many [preparedness-oriented] web pages and other scenarios of the impending collapse as they see it. A common theme in most of them is there will be a sudden and short lived phase of total chaos. In your novel "Patriots" I remember the couple who took to a storm drain while the blood ran in the streets overhead.

So let's say we are unfortunate enough that this really does happen, and at least half the people on the planet get wiped out in short order. Meanwhile, the other half can do nothing more than fight, run, and hunker down. And those survivors of the great collapse are all very careful about cooking odors, no perfumes, plain soap only, etc. The survivors are just dang busy setting up their means to survive, because its a new, tough world. But just weeks earlier, it was a much more sanitized world. In my 30 years as a Paramedic I was called out many times to check out "that foul odor" coming from somebody's house or apartment.

I can't even begin to imagine what its going to smell like with about three billion fresh corpses scattered around rotting without a single funeral home open for business. I can tell you its probably not going to smell too good! Heaven help us who are down wind of a major city!

Sure, in time the problem will fade away. But let's face facts, most people don't have any real exposure to the possible stench "The Big Die Off" will conjure up. So, what are some recommendations to get through "The Big Stink" while you are trying to survive the post social chaos event? Vicks Vapo-Rub under the Nose? I can tell you from first hand experience that it offers only minimal relief. I became quite good at putting on a Fire Fighters Self Contained Breathing Pack. Some of our Tactical Team Medics who went to New Orleans in the days following Hurricane Katrina can tell you a little about how its going to smell. Most of them ordered new uniforms after their deployment, since the old uniforms had taken on a new fragrance. - EM Joe

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