Those plans were tried and tested with folks from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and FEMA looking on the ensure that we could properly oversee an evacuation of the millions of people living in the 10-mile emergency planning zone around the plant. There was (an still is) a joint news center about 20 miles away, where we conducted day-long mock press conferences to simulated emergencies with real press present asking tough questions about how, where and when people would be protected from a radiological plume carried downwind from the plant. 

Successful drills ended with dinner and drinks at a local haunt where we toasted another drill season behind us, ignoring the question that was spoken in whispers if it was spoken at all. What would people really do if we had a genuine emergency?

There were sirens around the plants that were tested frequently. Would people respond if it were not a test or ignore it like some sort of grandiose fire drill? Would people read the emergency planning booklets that were mailed to every household in the 10 mile emergency planning zone? Would they follow them if they did?

As I watch the emergency preparedness machine kick into action around this swine flu and monitor the response of the public to these messages (partly because I am a communication geek and partly because I teach a public opinion course and this is a fascinating real-time case study), I continue to be stunned by the palpable lack of trust most people feel toward both the government and the media. I cannot say that I do not understand it or that it is not warranted, but it makes me wonder if trust is going the way of the dodo bird.

So I ask you. Who or what do you trust?  How do you make that decision? What would you need to see to believe that the potential threat of the swine flu was, in fact, real?