On June 21st, I attended the Rappahannock-Rapidan Regional Bird

On June 21st, I attended the

Rappahannock-Rapidan Regional Bird Flu Summit at Culpeper High School. This summit followed the invitation-only Virginia State Summit on March 23 in Richmond, and a bird flu seminar held in April at Fauquier Hospital, Warrenton.

Of the 1,800 invitations that were mailed out, only 200 people came - and many of these folks, like myself, heard about the summit from media releases and “word of mouth,” not the targeted invitations.

One of our State representatives, Mr. Ed Scott attended, but where were the heads of major companies and utilities? Where were the high level leadership of religious organizations, non-profits and other volunteer organizations? In short, where were the real decision-makers and primary leaders of our communities?

Surely, some must have come, but if they did, they maintained a very low profile because I didn’t see or hear any of them, and I’m sure they would have seen and heard me.

My feelings about the summit are mixed. Dr. Lillian Peake, director of the Rappahannock-Rapidan region of the Virginia public health department, is a superlative speaker. VDOH’s veterinary epidemiologist, Dr. Julia Murphy, presented an excellent overview of the possible bird flu pandemic.

I have great respect for Dr. Peake and the difficult task ahead of her and her colleagues, but it is becoming increasing obvious to me and others who are paying close attention to the course of the bird flu situation, that not enough is being done to real* ly get the public’s attention.

In accordance with the current “official” government story - aimed at not panicking the public - Dr. Peake presented statistics that were based on the relatively mild 1957 and 1968 influenza pandemics, rather than what is truly considered the worst case scenario of the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918-20. She also used the lowest estimates of the deaths for the Spanish Flu; i.e., 20-40 million, though many experts are now leaning toward 100 million as being the actual number of deaths worldwide. India alone suffered more than 20 million.

I appreciated the fact that the Summit included a panel of government leaders from the five counties - Frank Bossio, Culpeper County Administrator; Catherine Heritage, Assistant County Administrator, Fauquier; Carl Pumphrey, Madison County’s Director of Emergency Services;