You didn't pay attention reading the Survivalist Guide or World War Z did you?
I paid attention, and following the premises set forth in the books they did not make sense.
WWZ the zombies started out in poorer countries, the infected rich (relativly speaking) went to Europe and America hopeing for a cure. they carried it into hospitals, infecting heundreds in a short period of time.
Ah, but you seem to assume that people, when confronted by a biting maniac, will just lay down and take it, and act like as if nothing ever happened. This seems to be a fairly common assumption among the people following Brooks. In fact it was Brooks who made me write the OP, since his version of the zombie is so utterly unfrightening.
If we know that there is a strange new disease ravaging Africa, and an infected person bites you... Do you think you will just carry on with your life as normal? If those people start biting people at the hospital... Don't you think any sort of guard will pacify them? If we also I doubt they will manage to bite more than a couple of people actually before pacified by the prison guards. The basic mechanisms behind zombie infestation will be discovered extremely quickly if this scenario is true. The implications are obvious: If your beloved one after having been bitten by an infested African and subsequently gets a strange fewer and dies, send him to the hospital. I don't know of anyone who wouldn't do this even if there weren't a fear of a new exotic disease. How long do you think it will take the hospitals to find out that the dead bodies will reanimate? 24 hours? 25? Not long. After it has happened once or twice. Probably the observers in Africa and Asia has already discovered it.
So if you know that a) people infected tend to bite other people like as if they were maniacs and b) the infection spreads through biting and c) the dead people will rise again, the infection will be easy to contain. Just "kill" all the dead people.
Also the Brookian zombie infection uses 24 hours to completely infest the victim. This is so long that the zombies can't ever reach critical mass. The only way a Brookian apocalypse can happen is if people are replaced with unquestioning, unimaginative dolls.
1) Depends...if it's an airborn or swallowed infection, then it'd just get into the air faster. I think the basis of the "removing the head" refers to shattering the brain and severing the spinal cord; which is far more difficult with an AK than a Spas.
2) People not trained in firing an assault rifle are FAR more likely to hurt themselves and others rather than the target. The kick back alone will knock a unbraced man into traction.
3) Subduing zombies is a lot more difficult than humans; because Zombies don't respond to immobilization techniques or intimidation. And the Police are gonna be equally as scared.
4) Have you EVER heard of a press photographer not trying to get an exclusive personal shoot?
Again, the assumption that people will act completely irrationally. First, I don't think the armies of the world are unused to firing assault rifles. And I doubt normal people will go hunting zombies with weapons they can't use. For the subduing part, zombies does not have superhuman strength. Neither do they get the adrenaline-rush effect. As someone who knows a little of wrestling and stuff (not much but the basics) I can say that someone completely stiff would be the easiest to subdue. The police are trained to handle drug-abusers, mad people and others, so handling a zombie should be easy. They'll regard him as a very fucked up junkie.
As for the press photographer: Imagine that a known madman walks against you, and that you can see that his intent is to hurt you. Will you just stand there and wait for him to grab and bite you? No? Didn't think so. Provided the photographers are able to dodge a walking, wailing man coming against them at speeds of 3-6 km/hour, they should be pretty safe. Even a person in a wheelchair would be able to do dodge a zombie.