As Christmas approaches, children of all ages think about what they want for gifts. Once you get beyond a certain age, you find you have most of what you really need. If you haven’t needed something for the last fifty years, it’s not likely to become a necessity tomorrow! As many older people know, thinking about getting something is often more fun than actually getting the thing.
As preppers, what things do we lack, because we aren’t allowed to own them? There will forever be weaknesses in our supplies. Once a year, it’s good to look at our supplies and see where we’re lacking. Take an inventory.
In the event of a zombie apocalypse, the three things I lack that I’d want would be:
1. Claymore mines. You’ll never fight off zombies with a shotgun. If you find yourself confronted by superior numbers and want to protect an area, mines are the way to go. Needless to say, these things are seriously dangerous and would only be used if you knew murderous gangs roamed the wasteland. To paraphrase A Christmas Story: You’ll blow your eyes out. Alas, we’ll never have them because they’re illegal.
2. Narcotics. These can be useful in events far short of a zombie apocalypse. If you’re with buddies climbing in a remote area and somebody falls and breaks their body up really badly, it would be good to have a way to ease the pain until you could get help. Unless the situation is that extreme thou, you should never self-medicate with narcotics. You’ll become addicted. Nothing worse than spending the holidays panhandling to feed your drug addiction.
3. Antibiotics. The modern miracle drug to fight bacteria. This is the one thing we have a chance of getting several ways. You could ask your doctor for a prescription. Say you’re outfitting a first aid kit for wilderness adventure. Get Zithromax (Z-Pack) if you can. That seems to be a go-to antibiotic frequently prescribed by doctors.
The serious problem with antibiotics is that most of us don’t always know when to use them. Antibiotics won’t fight viral infections. How would you know if you have a viral or a bacterial infection?
Another issue is that antibiotics can expire. Using some beyond their expiration date can be lethal. It’s not just that they become less effective. They break down into harmful compounds that can kill. Doxycycline is one such antibiotic. Because preppers have a penchant for keeping things beyond their expiration, I’d avoid Doxycycline.
Print out information about the drugs you store or get a nurse’s guide to help you understand more about your medicine stash and appropriate dosages.
Thanks to Trace over at tracemypreps.com, I’ve changed my position about fish antibiotics. Fish antibiotics appear to be the same exact drugs that are prescribed for people. It’s possible they’re made in the same factories as the human versions. You can purchase them at veterinary stores.
With any medicine, you should look at the color and any stampings on the pill to identify it and see if it matches the human drug you want. This is a good procedure for any drug you’re given: pharmacists can make errors.
Antibiotics come in a bewildering assortment of choices. Fish Pen is penicillin. Many of us were told as children that we’re allergic to penicillin. But it might not be true. Given the availability of penicillin-like compounds, it’s good to get tested to see if you really are allergic to it today. In a crisis, those compounds might be the only ones available.
If you’re allergic to penicillin, it’s very possible you can’t use the human-engineered versions either. These are common: Amoxicillin (Fish Mox) and Ampicillin (Fish Cillin). If you have a penicillin allergy, you’re supposed to stay away from these go-to antibiotics.
Other choices include Cipro-Ciprofloxacin (Fish Flox) and Erythromycin (Fish Mycin). Be sure to only select antibiotics you know are prescribed for humans.
For Christmas, all I really want are a few fish antibiotics. How do you pill a goldfish anyway?
preppernextdoor 