England Unprepared For Zombie Apocalypse

When the United States Centers for Disease Control published their plan for handling a zombie apocalypse, others around the world started to think. Were their nations as prepared as the United States? This is an important, even critical question. If we are to assume that a zombie outbreak would be a worldwide phenomenon, it should go without saying that the first people to get their brains eaten will be the low-hanging fruit - that is, citizens of countries that dismiss or even mock the possible dangers right up to the end. If this report from the English city of Leicester is typical for the rest of the nation one of those countries could be the United Kingdom.

The correspondence from a worried member of the public basically outlined how lacking the city's provisions are for dealing with a zombie attack: 'Having watched several films, it is clear that preparation for such an event is poor and one that councils throughout the kingdom must prepare for.'

Signed 'Concerned Citizen', the letter continued: 'Please provide any information you may have.'

'We've had a few wacky ones before but this one did make us laugh,' Lynn Wyeth, head of information governance, told the BBC of the letter.

'To you it might seem frivolous and a waste of time... but to different people it actually means something,' she added of the information request.

'Everybody has their own interests and their own reasons for asking these questions.'

Although she granted she's unaware of specific references to zombie invasions in the council's existing emergency plans, Ms Wyeth said some elements of them could be applied if a 28 Days Later-type situation were indeed to arise.

To put it bluntly, in the face of a real zombie apocalypse it would rapidly become clear that people like Ms. Wyeth are contributing to the problem. While mass zombification is statistically unlikely, the consequences of it occurring are so extremely dire that preparations should be made. The English may feel that their island nation is protected on the grounds that since zombies don't breathe they also don't float and can't swim, but this ignores the possibility that the agent responsible for the conversion could become airborne and thus easily sweep across the Channel.

Here's calling on the British government to assemble a plan for dealing with a zombie apocalypse as the Centers for Disease Control have already done here in the States. The lives they save could very well be their own.