Los Angeles, CA – The Los Angeles County Fire Department announced plans Monday to join in the City’s effort to prevent the recent outbreaks of Hepatitis A and Typhus from reaching epidemic levels by conducting carefully controlled burns of the county’s homeless population.
“We’re starting with Skid Row, obviously,” explained LAFP Chief Dale Mahorn. “But ultimately, if we’re really taking this health crisis seriously, we’re gonna have to torch the freeway underpasses, tent cities, and other densely populated makeshift shelters before these wicked viruses really start using their indigent hosts to threaten the public.”
Chief Mahorn went on to describe previous plans to contain the diseases including crop-dusting the homeless with insecticide to kill disease-carrying fleas, lice, and schizophrenics. However, some members of the community voiced concern that the Santa Ana winds could carry the chemicals into residential neighborhoods where actual people live.
Experimental burns are already underway in a few of the more isolated homeless encampments including the LA River between CA-2 and the I-5 freeways. While these containment efforts have been successful in reducing the number of Hepatitis-A carriers in the area, a few rogue embers reached the river’s drought-stricken vegetation and brush, causing a major wildfire in Griffith Park.
