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Awhile back, at work, we had a team building meeting. We had those occasionally, to inspire thought and such. Mostly lame, but I get the point, and I liked the employer, so I played along for the fun of it.

However one of the "games" was that you were a helicopter pilot, and had to fly out to an island with an erupting volcano. It was a 45 minute trip, and you were the only helicopter available to rescue people on the island. There were 10 people on the small island, but you could only carry 3 passengers.

This game kinda torqued me off tho, because it geared you to make moral judgments on people. You were informed of the people on the island. There was a retired couple in their 70s, a 26 YO unmarried mom with her 9 year old son, a 32 year old gay man with AIDS, a 54 year old white businessman, and so on

So our group had to discuss what we would do if we were the pilot. In a sense, it is like this flu discussion, and you have to triage the people.

The facilitator did not like my answer. I said I would land the helicopter about a half mile away, and the first 3 that got to me would live to see tomorrow. That is my triage. (She didn't get the jollies of hearing me say the AIDS guy would die (and how evil that was)). Hey, if Mr. AIDS guy got to me in the top 3, we'd be flying away.

But if this flu thing really gets out of hand (which I highly, highly doubt), sometimes somebody has gotta make decisions that aren't that pleasant.