Here are a few things to consider before you start taking poison to save you from poison:
makeshift fallout shelters, which are likely to be poorly ventilated and ill equipped to treat or dispose of wastes, would create the conditions for the rapid spread of disease. Providing that the survivors endure this period, they would face similar difficulties outside. The lack of sanitary systems, the absence of power for refrigeration, the presence of millions of unburied dead, and a disturbed ecological balance fostering the rapid growth in insect populations would combine to produce an environment fertile for the contraction and transmission of disease. The complex interactive effects of stress, malnutrition, and an immune system damaged by radiation would tend to weaken the physiological defenses to a point where people may succumb to diseases presently considered to be only moderately virulent.
4
It might not be unreasonable to anticipate postwar pandemics similar to those just described. Survivors weakened by malnutrition could not expect to be vaccinated nor would antibiotics be available in sufficient quantities to prevent complications.
The focus of health care therefore shifts from the immediate problems of administering postattack aid to the longer-term issues surrounding reconstruction. The number of casualties produced by hunger and exposure would not be significantly altered by the availability of trained medical personnel and pharmaceuticals. Access to food and energy would prove to be the key to survival. The prospects for avoiding catastrophe are tied inextricably to the prospects for reconstruction.
Food, fuel, water and the wandering bands of shitbags wanting what you have (or what they THINK you have), will keep you so busy trying to kill them before they kill you, you won't be able to eat, sleep, wash your ass............... Some people have been watching too many survival shows and seeing the 5 gallon buckets of rice and beans.