When all hell breaks lose and society has crumbled into chaos its important to have a plan, as those first few moments could make the difference between life and death. In the event of a world ending apocalypse what you do in the long run will depend entirely on your geographical location and what you have at your disposal, but no matter where you are the following places should be avoided at all costs. Note the following are being considered in an apocalyptic event such as a super virus or complete and absolute breakdown of all laws and societies.
1) Hospitals
In the event of a super virus outbreak or zombie infestation, hospitals will be on the front lines of the spread. The first few sick people will be brought to these places and by the time the outbreak has been officially declared, they will contain the patient zero batch and already be compromised. Since they have their own backup generators they will be running after the main grid has gone down, and act as a beacon to anyone looking to raid a few medical goods.
As soon as people realise they can no longer get their prescriptions, ordinary law abiding civilians would rather break into a pharmacy to steal medicine for their loved ones than watch them die without, and so medical facilities will not only be the centers of an initial outbreak, but will be swarmed with people willing to do anything to get their medicine.
2) Police stations and army bases
When the police stop responding to individual calls, which will probably happen quite fast, people will seek protection by going to places of law enforcement. The only problem with this is that everyone will be going to a building designed to work more like an office than anything else, and most police stations are in populated areas.
Cramming hundreds of people into a small space with no way of feeding or looking after them in anyway is a recipe for disaster. The more people there are in a single area the greater the chance of a virus being transmitted, and even if no one is infected your still going to be stuck in a building with no food or water and a handful of police to protect you.
Army bases would probably be more dangerous than a town center would, because the second the government realised the country was gone and they had nothing to lose, they’d probably order their bases protected at any cost, including shooting people on site.
3) Large supermarkets
Even though it would make sense to stock up at the start of an apocalypse, this is exactly what everyone else will be thinking. The main risk here is getting into a fight with other people looking to secure food for themselves. Most ordinary people wouldn’t think twice about clubbing you round the back of the head with a jar of pickles if it meant they could grab your trolley full of food to feed their family.
Arriving at a supermarket after an apocalypse was made public would either mean you’d have first grabs at plenty of food if you get there fast enough, or it would be life threatening chaos as angry looters fight to the death over the last few cans of beans.
4) Towns and cities
The more people there are then the more infected or raiders there will be. Roads leading out of large settlements will quickly become blocked, leaving thousands of people in a place that will never receive power, fresh water or food deliveries ever again. When everyone realises how screwed they are they’ll start to stockpile supplies by any means necessary, including killing each other. Even if you managed to get somewere safe then all you’ve done is given yourself a small amount of time before the inevitable happens, and when you eventually run out of supplies without the possibility of getting more, you’ll be forced to travel through the territory of whoever managed to survive so long.
5) Transportation hubs
Airports, train stations and major docks should be avoided at all costs since not only would they get shut down right away in the event was a virus outbreak, but there’s the very real chance that it wont be any better on the other side. You may manage to take off in a plane only to find the runway at your destination has been compromised, or the train tracks have been blocked in the middle of no where.
They would also be the sites of mass panic as people would flock to them in order to get away from whatever was happening, and the second they stopped running chaos would break out. If you think the airports are bad at the best of times then imagine what it would be like with tens of thousands of extra people all looking to get on any flight they can, no matter the cost.