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Relax – You can’t eat Toilet Paper – COVID-19 Blind Panic

Right now, it is almost impossible to go an hour without seeing or hearing about COVID-19. It is running amuck in most of the world right now causing shortages and fear.

Please watch out for yourself and your loved ones.  Maintain good hygiene by washing your hands well (soap and warm water for 20 seconds) and using other sanitation item you may have. Practice isolation from the general public to whatever degree you can. Just to be safe. If you are in areas that do not have mandatory shelter-in-place orders, halting the spread of the virus might help to keep it that way.

The key is to be safe and prepared but not to panic. Panic is driving the toilet paper shortage (for no good reason). Those loading up on toilet paper, but not any other essentials, may find themselves very hungry if this lasts an extended period of time. Stocking up on things like canned soups, crackers, peanut butter, and protein bars are a good idea. All of these have an extended shelf life and most can be eaten without heating them.

As an alternate to toilet paper since it does seem to be hard to track down, flush-able wipes can still be found some places. I suggest using Amazon so you can avoid the stores.

Flushable Wipes

They also have toilet paper, though not as cheap as before and not a common brand

Toilet paper

Pick up some protein bars and peanut butter while you are there if you need to stock up.

Cliff Bars

Peanut Butter

Again, stay safe out there by using common sense to limit your exposure and avoid the panic that the unprepared seem to be having.

If you have questions or concerns feel free to contact me on the Contact page

Contact Leveled Survival

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OPSEC for Civilians – Keeping Secrets

The word OPSEC can be heard in a lot of discussions of survival preparedness and apocalyptic stories. A lot of individuals do not understand what that means because it is a primarily military term. As with lots of military vocabulary, this is an abbreviation for a longer phrase. OPSEC began as the phrase “operations security.” Operations security is defined on Wikipedia as

“a process that identifies critical information to determine if friendly actions can be observed by enemy intelligence, determines if information obtained by adversaries could be interpreted to be useful to them, and then executes selected measures that eliminate or reduce adversary exploitation of friendly critical information.”

In layman’s terms this means that you keep vital information related to planning out of the hands of anyone you do not trust completely.

This can be traced back to some concepts developed in World War II. One example is this World War II poster by Seymour R. Goff. It is the early example of the “Loose lips sink ships” phrase.

 

Another is this poster that comes from the Women’s Army Corps anti-rumor propaganda (1941–1945).

This may seem like a purely military idea, but it is not. The planning that you do is in order to protect yourself and loved ones. Some other people are not of the same mindset though. I have even seen people boasting online that they don’t need to stock supplies because they will just take what they need when the time comes. Sadly, this is a real possibility.

This is not to say that all your planning needs to be done in a whisper in the backroom or by using invisible ink. You may feel that no one should know you have any plans set up. That is fine. At the least though, it means that certain details may be restricted to your family or group. These details might include how many supplies you have set aside, where they are stored, any bug out locations you have planned for, or weapons you may have. Basically any details that could be used to derail your plans should be protected. No one wants to have the worst-case scenario happen and then show up to your bug out location to find it occupied by your heavily armed coworker.

So, to finalize, don’t hesitate to discuss planning if you feel safe in doing it. The free exchange of ideas is what improves planning and creates relationships that may be vital in an emergency. Letting everyone in earshot know how much food you have in your garage might not be a good idea though. Use common sense when deciding what to discuss and with whom.