(Rick Scott Is TOAST)-This is what healthcare looks like when austerity trumps public health policy.

[haele]

19. Last major cholera outbreak in US was in NYC, brought by a ship of immigrants in 1910.

NYC public health and sanitation were on top of it as soon as the ship hit port, quarantined anyone that had come in contact with the ship, and only 11 people died. If this action against TB is any indication of the reaction of Florida's public health and sanitation departments, we could be looking at a large number of deaths quickly expanding across the country due to the availability of quick mass transportation and exposure to even a single carrier. The sanitary infrastructure of the US has degraded over the past five decades to a level that we hope is equivalent to that of 1910...

The "second pandemic" of 1827 through the 1850's in the US killed over 150,000 across the US - in cities and rural areas, and all types of communities. A carrier could be contagious for days before they show symptoms - but once they get sick, death comes pretty quickly. And it didn't matter if they were poor or wealthy; just one contagious servant, or a delivery man, or even produce bought from a market-woman who just hadn't gotten sick yet, and the rich who would wall themselves off thinking that would keep them from getting sick died just as easily as the push-cart vendor,
Cholera is still rather strange; it's thought to be a mix of poor sanitation and bacterial contagion, but there are several distinct bacterial strains in the wild that have suddenly flared up without warning and propagate for a couple decades, then just go dormant just as quickly for no apparent reason, and people have been recorded developing the disease without apparently being at risk due to exposure or poor sanitation.

This modern strain from Haiti has already infected over 500,000 people in Haiti and the Dominican Republic, and may have killed as many as 15,000, depending on if you believe the Haitian government or the WHO. Cuba's medical system should be able to handle the disease, but the other islands may be in trouble. Just as much trouble as Florida would be in.