President B.H. Obama on Swine flu:
I’ve consulted with our public health officials extensively on a day-to-day basis, in some cases an hour-to-hour basis. At this point they have not recommended a border closing. From their perspective it would be akin to closing the barn door after the horses are out, because we already have cases here in the United States.
From an actual epidemiologist:
The barn door analogy is just nonsense (on stilts!). 91 cases in a population of 300 million can be managed and isolated. No need to add to the number unnecessarily. It may not be necessary to place shoulder to shoulder border guards, but some common sense about looking hard at people entering is a decent start at prevention. Most people know what sick people look like…
And another epidemiologist (again courtesy of Mark Krikorian):
If you control localized eruptions, but continually allow new cases in to inoculate fresh foci, the number of total infections would be higher. The effect of new influx will be minimal if a true pandemic is already present, but that is not the current case.
But surely… the president couldn’t be wrong. He’s pro-science!