Top 3 Most Important Things We Know About Zombies

Ever notice that in many zombie movies, the characters do not seem to know much about dealing with flesh-eating undead until it's too late?  Well, let's not do that here.  I'd like to think that we know better.  There are enough generally-known facts that we can work with to ensure our immediate survival during an initial encounter with walking dead.

(1) Headshots or Head Trauma

Does it bug you that well-trained shooters such as soldiers or police shoot zombies on the torso despite the zombie's continued forward approach?  Shooting a zombie in the head or delivering a crushing blow to the head will stop the zombie cold.  Destroy the brain and you'll eliminate the only organ that drives the zombie's base nature to eat.  The zombie becomes a lifeless pile of flesh once the brain is gone.  Source: Popular Mechanics

But this point begs the question: how can a person with no shooting experience perform in a situation that calls for headshots?  See this video from Immersion on YouTube and get an insight on the topic.

(2) Don't Get Bitten

Zombies must eat.  It is in their nature.  And they feed on living flesh, ignoring the abundance of dead meat caused by their wake.  That's why you do not see zombies tearing each other apart for food, lust, or other reasons.

But you, they will eat.  The first chance they get, they will bite your arms, neck, legs, or any other parts of you.  Zombies with functioning hands will grab on to you to prevent your escape.  When trapped by a horde, you will surely be overwhelmed, dragged down, and have your flesh torn away.

Image credit: Tanya Plonka (Lethbridge Photographer) via Flickr

Macabre as it may seem, getting devoured by a horde of living dead may not be the worse thing that could happen to you in a zombie apocalypse.  Being bitten by one and getting away is worse, not just for you, but for your companions as well.  The bite of a zombie transfers an infectious virus to the victim.  This means if you're bit then sometime later, you will become a zombie and turn on your friends and family.  So take extra precautions when in a hand-to-hand fight against the living dead.  Zombie bites are not like dog bites that can be cured by a tetanus shot (see the next point below). Source: FVZA.org

(3) Can't Save An Infected

This third point is a correlation to number 2, but so important that it requires its own point. 

You can't stop someone who has been bitten by a zombie from becoming a zombie herself.  The bite carries a deadly infection, the same virus that's causing the outbreak and chaos all around you.  Other than immediate amputation of a bitten arm or leg and the hope that the virus has not yet spread throughout the victim's body, there is no known cure for a zombie bite.  Source:  Surviving Modern Life

Thus, if you and your 10 year old daughter are surprised by a zombie and she gets bit, yet both of you escape, your daughter will eventually become a zombie and attack you.

At first, she'll be sick and weaken to a point where she can't stand on her own two feet.  At this time, her body's natural defenses are putting up a losing fight against the zombie virus.  Eventually, her body will give in, she will die, turn into a livng dead, and attack you or any companions nearby.  Though she may still look like your daughter, she's no longer your child.

Zombie child from Night of the Living Dead

This means that if someone is bitten, it is best to either kill her immediately with a headshot (see point 1) or keep her separated from the rest of the group until she turns and then kill her.  After all, our parental instinct is to sit beside our sick child while caring for her.  But sitting "beside our sick child" is well within grabbing and biting distance of a newly-turned but no-less infectious zombie.  In other words, don't come too close to someone who's been infected.