The Premonition: A Pandemic Story by Michael Lewis

(New York: Norton, 2021), 301

“When a doctor stops seeing patients, they slowly start to forget. Seeing patients is how you develop a sixth sense.” (24)
“To do the job of a local public-health officer, you basically always need to be willing to lose your job.” (32)
- “Sins of commission got you fired. Sins of omission you could get away with, but they left people dead.” (42)
Charity Dean: "Mental masturbation is actually an important concept. It's when you talk in circles for an hour and reach no decision." (38)
US pandemic plan began in 2005 when George W. Bush read The Great Influenza by John Barry (50)
- the leverage of Writing and sharing writing: (53-54)
- Rajeev’s report got $7B in funding
- Barry’s book: aid gave it to sec of HHS, who asked for 50 copies and had it marked up to highlight the important bits, and gave it to Bush
“When the systems depend on human vigilance, they will fail.” (67)
Carter Mecher: redesign the environment to prevent mistakes (eg 120 vs 240 V plugs) (69)
- Human Error by James Reason: “it was like reading the owners manual of the human mind”
- “the best way to guard against error is to design systems with layered and overlapping defenses”—> think of it as layered Swiss cheese (70)
- report near misses like aviation safety
Carter: I love how he dives into a problem, “reading books and interviewing authors” to find out how people learn and how good ideas spread, and then wrote a report (72)
Bob Glass model: no measures have significant impact, except closing schools (86-87)
- “I couldn’t design a system better for transmitting disease than our school system.” (91)
Carter reconstructed and furthered Barry’s analysis of the 1918 pandemic in Philadelphia to show that deaths were lower the earlier restrictions were imposed (101-102)
2009 virus left people more confident in not taking action: “Experience is making the same mistake over and over again, only with greater confidence” (124)
A map/plan is a starting point, even if not perfect it gives you options to keep trying” (125)
the Mann Gulch fire as a metaphor for pandemics (172)
- book: Young Men and Fire by Norman Maclean (172, 186)
Charity Dean was in Winston Churchill’s position before WWII in Jan 2020 when Sonia Angell blocked her from pandemic preparedness, and she found solace in Alone by William Manchester (198)
fire extinguisher analogy: “the problem with implementing social interventions too late is you get all the downsides and little benefit, so speed it critical” (211)
Charity Dean: “Why doesn’t the United States have the institutions it needs to save itself?” (279, cf. We Must Found Institutions, Not Just Preserve Them: A Conservatism of Creation - Public Discourse)
CDC cowardice: The Swine Flu Affair smeared David Sencer for his vaccination program in 1976 and sent a message to future public health officials who might stick their necks out (286)

Bibliography

The Great Influenza by John Barry (50)
Young Men and Fire by Norman Maclean (172, 186)
The Swine Flu Affair (286)

Created: 2021-08-12
Updated: 2023-01-23-Mon