And, as for being able to accept die-off/such, as a parent this is a nightmare scenario.  It is possible, but it is one that I am fighting to maintain as 'scenario' rather than reality.

Yes.
You have to love someone--then it becomes an unacceptable scenario, and worthy of your very best efforts to prevent--rather like the feelings of an Iraqi parent struggling to save his child from cholera--or Blackwater.

Capitalism searches out the darkest corners of human potential, and mainlines them.