The "Bible" for Emergency Prep & Survival, Plus Green & Healthy Living

Is it not already too late if one waits until one is thirsty to begin digging a well?

-Chinese Proverb

The devastation of New Orleans, combined with the current rash of wild fires in the West and severe weather in the East, brings home the fact that climate change and ecological collapse are bad for business (and people's lives). Ready or not, life as we know it is going to change radically over the next decade. I doubt that we will see technology fail completely, but I am certain that we will see increasing environmental and political instabilities that will create disruptions in the flow of electricity, goods, and central services to huge numbers of people, and that America will not be spared from societal disruptions on a global scale.

When Technology Fails, a book by Matthew Stein, provides something for everyone, from folks who just want to help their families when disaster strikes, to the go-it-alone survivalist, to the eco-minded person who wishes to tread more lightly on the earth, whatever the future may hold. Hurricane Katrina, the Tsunami in Asia, and 9/11 really bring it home. How many of us are prepared for disruptions of this magnitude? How will you cope if the water stops flowing out of your tap, or if gasoline and electricity are unavailable? If the doctors and hospitals are overloaded, can you deal with common medical emergencies? How can we do our part to minimize our impact on this planet, and to live more sustainably?

Post Peak Living UnCrash Course

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Prepare quickly by registering in the Post Peak Living UnCrash Course, a comprehensive six-week online course designed to help you thrive in a post-peak world. 
Expert instructors who have been preparing for years will support you to prepare in the following areas:
  • Food. Get ready for short-term breakdowns in food supply as well as long term food growing and storage.
  • Finances and shelter. How can you husband your resources and keep you and your family sheltered? Should you move?
  • Health. What can you do now to get and stay healthy?   
  • Transportation. How will you move around, obtain food and visit the doctor?
  • Skills.  What skills will the community be willing to pay you for or barter with you?
  • Disaster Preparation. Is your disaster kit adequate for a post-peak world? Do you even have a disaster kit?
Click here to find out more and to register.

When a Super-Bug Strikes Close to Home, How Can You Deal With it?

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By Matthew Stein, P.E., Author of When Technology Fails: A Manual for Self-Reliance, Sustainability and Surviving the Long Emergency, ISBN #978-1933392455, Chelsea Green Publishing, White River Junction, VT (800) 639-4099 www.chelseagreen.com www.whentechfails.com

Certain bacterial infections now defy all antibiotics.

—Stuart Levy, M.D.

We have to recognize that we are in the most dramatic moment of the epidemic… And the number of cases will unfortunately increase and that's why we will reinforce all the measures necessary to contain the outbreak.

—Mexican Health Secretary Jose Angel Cordova, Monday April 27, 2009

It appears that the “next pandemic” may be budding right now in the form of a new strain of deadly swine flu that has spread throughout large parts of Mexico, closing schools in Mexico City and sending millions of people to their homes. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), Cases of this new strain of swine flu has already been confirmed in California, Kansas, New York, Ohio and Texas, as well as several other countries, raising the specter for its potential to blossom into a global pandemic. Much like the 1918 pandemic of Spanish Flu that killed an estimated 20-50 million people world wide, the scary part about this most recent outbreak is that most of Mexico’s dead are young previously healthy adults, ages 20-40. None of them were over 60 or under 3 years old, which are the age groups that are generally most susceptible to common human flu viruses.

12 Tips for the Sustainability Shift

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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/matthew-stein/making-the-shift-to-susta_b_...

These days, most people sense that our world is off balance and that we are sliding steadily towards some dark abyss. It can be hard to keep a cheerful positive outlook when you consider just these three signs of trouble:

Do The Right Thing!

Most of us just want to “do the right thing” for our selves, friends and families, but what is this “right thing”?

First, we must educate ourselves (knowledge is power!) about where our world is headed so we may have a realistic view of the challenges facing the world in the next few years and the following decades.

A Perspective on Relative Threats

In spite of the very real threat of terrorism, I believe that our greatest threats are from other sources. To gain some perspective, let's compare the impact of several major events:

The Main Threats to Our Future

As I see it, the four main threats to a stable American and world future are:

  •  PEAK OIL: The oil crisis of the 1970's was a result of a 5% drop in global oil production due to the OPEC oil embargo. We are facing an imminent, unavoidable drop in global oil production as most of the world's oil fields are now in decline. Many oil industry experts state that global oil production has essentially already reached a plateau and predict that it will start to decline sometime between this year and the year 2010. This is happening at precisely the same time that the huge populations of China and India are rapidly expanding their industrial capacities and their appetite for oil.

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  •  ECO THREAT: Global warming and other climate changes (super storms, etc.) coupled with major ecosystem collapse are the basis for the Eco-Threat. Hurricane Katrina is a powerful example of the effects of climate change. When you consider that a single degree F of global warming so far has contributed to the changes in weather that most of us now acknowledge (RE: severity of hurricanes Katrina, Andrew, Mitch, etc.), and that a continuation of current consumption patterns is projected to result in a global warming that is 2.5 to 10 times as great over the next century, it is obvious there are potentially dire consequences for the stability and quality of human life on our planet.

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  •  BIO THREAT: We face a potential for massive plagues due to: 1) The ability of viruses to mutate into new forms that make the jump from animal to human species (i.e. Bird Flu). 2) The widespread use of antibiotics in animal feeds makes a perfect breeding ground for growing bacteria that are resistant to modern antibiotics. 3) The potential for terrorists to secretly infect populations with deadly bacteria or viruses and for them to spread the infection globally (air travel) before it is detected.

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  •  TERROR THREAT: The threat of terrorism is obvious. What is not quite as obvious is the connection between our dependence upon foreign oil and how it funds terrorism while putting our soldiers, engineers and oil company personnel in harms way, and draws the attacks of fanatical Muslim minorities in their attempt to drive American influences from the entire Middle East.

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Preparedness Planning

I suggest that you develop a personal preparedness plan, and have prepared the following checklist which may be printed from this web site's “Articles” section:

Positive Action

Many people ask, “What can I do?” Individually we can educate ourselves and prepare ourselves to cope with future instabilities in the climate and the supply of gasoline and central services. Remember, preparedness is disaster & terrorism insurance.

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