FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (AP) — A wildfire raging along the Grand Canyon’s North Rim that leveled a historic lodge erupted over the weekend after burning for more than a week, raising scrutiny over the National Park Service’s decision not to aggressively attack the fire right away.
Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs called for a federal investigation into the Park Service’s handling of the fire, which was sparked by lightning July 4.
“Arizonans deserve answers for how this fire was allowed to decimate the Grand Canyon National Park,” the governor said in a social media post Sunday. “The federal government chose to manage that fire as a controlled burn during the driest, hottest part of the Arizona summer.”
They seem to have dropped the ball on floods too.
I don’t want to be a doomer, but I feel pretty confident predicting some awful influenza, measles, covid and other easily transmitted (and prevented) diseases.
What will make it worse is that as the news trickles out about outbreaks, those reports will be countered by FUD, misinformation, bullshit and prevarication by the federal government. We won’t even be able to agree there is even a problem.
This will be compounded by local health infrastructure being at reduced capacity due to the precarious financial status of this infrastructure due to constant federal meddling with grants and funding. For many players in our disease prevention and treatment infrastructure, losing even a few percent of Federal money from their budgets can trigger a cascade of cutbacks and personnel losses.
Someone please tell I am being paranoid. I have worked in biomedical industries for years and I can’t see how we can avoid these consequences now.