Two questions, one scenario. Here’s the situation - in the city of Frederick, MA, a city of about 70,000 is home to Fort Detrick, a US biological research facility. Yeah, you see where this is going. Due to a catastrophic accident a modified variant of the Ebola virus escapes into the city; unlike regular Ebola it’s airborne and will due to its modifications is even more unlikely to have any cure or vaccine available in the foreseeable future.
The U.S. Government reacts swiftly and declares martial law in the city. On the advice of the CDC, who don’t tend to fuck around, they order in the army with NBC suits to establish a quarantine. Nobody gets in, nobody gets out. They’ll drop in food and necessities, but the disease (which we’ll call Hypothetical Airborne Ebola, HAE) will be left to burn itself out, then the survivors monitored closely to make sure they will infect nobody else before being allowed to go free.
Here’s the kicker. The quarantine against HAE will be enforced lethally, orders from the top - if anyone attempts to get out, they will be warned verbally, given a warning shot, then shot dead to prevent a breach.
Those two questions I mentioned. First question - you’re doing your cross-country tour of US biological warfare facilities (it’s a hobby) and staying in Frederick when HAE escapes. You’re caught inside the quarantine zone. Observing the guards patrolling, you notice a moment when all their backs are turned and you can sprint to freedom away from the hellish conditions inside the quarantine zone. You don’t feel sick, although the virus can incubate for up to 21 days. Should you?
Second question. You’re in the US Army manning the perimeter. Sweating in your NBC suit, you spot a lone figure approaching the edge of the quarantine zone. Through megaphone, they are told to halt immediately or be fired upon. They continue walking. As the closest soldier, you’re told to fire a warning shot. Shouldering your M4, you squeeze off a round to deliberately miss. They ignore the crack of your carbine and continue to the edge of the quarantine. Your CO orders you to enforce the quarantine by lethal means. You radio back to confirm your orders. Do you open fire?
For fucking once, can you people stop nitpicking and talk about the moral issue? Is it right to escape if you might infect others? Is shooting someone dead because they might be infected the correct thing to do? That’s what I’m driving on, not how quarantines work. Yeah, I know no quarantine has ever been lethally enforced, it would probably be in the news.
Run and run. Detaining people in inhumane conditions is in oral and illegal, and I feel no need to abide by rules of a government that would do that-- especially as there are perfectly humane ways of having quarantine. After my 21 days I would Immediately start joining whoever is protesting this thing.
Just want to apologise for snipping and getting overly snarky here, but literally just wanted to talk about the morals of an impossible situation (I’m sure no hypothetical superebola will be released into an American town, for instance), whether the idea of the greater good can applied morally in this situation or not (use zombies rather than superebola if you prefer).
Yes and yes. If I am in a location with a highly communicative disease that takes up to three weeks to develop symptoms, I have no way of knowing if I’ve contracted it at the time that escape is an option. I would feel a duty to remain within the quarantine boundaries.
Yes, if my orders are to kill anyone who breaches the boundaries and this lone figure has not responded to verbal warning or a warning shot, I’d feel duty-bound to kill him or her.
Assuming this is a strict countywide isolation rather than a quarantine. You go in there then you stay in there.
If I’m dumb enough to tour biological weapon research centers then I would have to accept that there is a larger chance of me becoming infected versus most other people. Why would I endanger others in the hopes that I am not infected if I knew other people could easily(?) spread what I have?
If I were convinced that this could lead to an extinction level event I would like to think I would hold the line. The needs of the many over the few…etc…
Minor nitpick, actions in a NBC suit are, at least in my time, horrible. Hard to see/aim, hard to hear. As a fireteam/squad leader I’d assign as many people to fire as possible.
The public health dork side of me says yes and yes.
The humanist side of me might well do something different in the heat of the moment, though. That level of stress and fear can overwhelm logic pretty easily.
In the situation you describe, it would be utterly irresponsible and selfish to for me to assume that I’m such a special snowflake that my comfort is important enough to risk spreading the disease to others. While I wouldn’t be happy, and am sure I’d be scared, I’d give up a few weeks of freedom to stop the spread of the disease. Likewise, as a soldier, I’d shoot someone trying to escape, though I think I’d try to disable them, rather than kill them, assuming there’s still an active medical facility in the quarantine zone that could treat them afterwards.
If I were in an area when it broke out I’d take measures to be as safe as I could, but again why endanger people to get what I might have.
Just about everybody can pull a trigger. However getting a good sight picture through a lens that doesn’t make it easy to get a clear sight picture hinders accuracy.
If you aren’t dehydrated because NBC suits suck…and the lens is clear enough to see a damn thing…and if the mask is pliable enough to get a good sight picture…and if you have a decent firing platform…
Try this:
First get your ultimate hangover. Get some giant 1970’s sunglasses that you can only see clearly in the center. Smack yourself on the side of your head, hard enough to ring your ears, so the glasses are somewhere else on your head and focus on a target ‘x’ yards away through your glasses. Hit your target.
Okay, while it’s interesting that you’ve had some first-hand experience with something like this, we’re talking about a fictional hypothetical situation in this thread. The specs of the fictional suit you’d be fictionally wearing in this fictional fantasy are not relevant; your moral decision is.
Stay put and kill them at once. An M4 has 3-round burst mode, so I’d use that. More rounds down-range, and maybe it will get the attention of other guards who will come to my aid in taking out the target.
Meaningful discussions of morality require fighting the hypothetical. A great deal of immorality in the world has been committed by people who refused to consider alternate options.
As I said earlier I would like to think I’d hold the line. If a random person came up on the line I’d shoot. M249 Squad Automatic Weapon, accuracy by volume.
Morally, if this were a stranger I’d put them down. Morally if this were someone I cared about (there are a few), I’d let command know I’m going in, disarm myself, and walk them back into the area and hunker down.
