A Mall Setting in Georgia for H1N1 Vaccinations
Elizabeth Hausauer and Connie Russell
April 28, 2010
Advance planning, a can-do spirit of cooperation, a focus on the small details, and excellent communications skills – all were essential ingredients in Georgia’s eminently successful campaign to protect the citizens of that great state from the global flu pandemic.
Law Enforcement Pandemic Resilience: Time to Recalibrate
Joseph W. Trindal
April 28, 2010
The global-disaster scenario originally forecast fell far short of the dire predictions. Which is a good reason to celebrate. But not a reason to stop planning and preparing for “what might have been.” Hurricane Katrina taught many lessons worth learning, the most important of which is that states, communities, and individual citizens sometimes get a second chance – but not always, and no one knows when.
Using Regulations to Neutralize Red Tape
Joseph Cahill
April 21, 2010
In times of urgent need, a “probably acceptable” solution is almost always better than one that is demonstrably not very effective and/or has failed in the past. That is the common-sense understanding reflected in the Emergency Use Authorization rule that permits the FDA to approve apparently effective – but not totally tested and validated – medications and medical devices when the nation is facing imminent disasters.
Pandemic Preparedness: Advance Planning Is Mandatory
Jennifer Smither
April 21, 2010
Healthcare workers, first responders, and emergency managers in Louisiana and Missouri used the H1N1 global pandemic to demonstrate how an imminent disaster – combined with information sharing, the early promulgation of preparedness plans, and a modicum of managerial expertise – can provide valuable lessons learned to cope with future disasters more effectively and at lower cost to the taxpayers.
Compare Your Thoughts with Those from National Experts on…Pandemic Preparedness & Response
Paul E. Jarris and John F. Morton
April 21, 2010
The nation’s “Pandemic Preparedness & Response” capabilities – and deficiencies – are examined,
debated, and discussed by the DOMPREP40 panel of career emergency-management and domestic-preparedness
professionals. As with previous such surveys, readers are asked, and cordially invited, to make their
own judgments on a broad spectrum of these literally life-or-death matters.
H1N1: Learning from a Less-Than-Worst-Case Scenario
Craig DeAtley
April 14, 2010
The best that can be said, usually, about worst-case scenarios, after the fact, is that they never actually happened. But the just-in-case preparations for the 2009-10 H1N1 “Swine Flu” global scare generated some residual training benefits, and even the mistakes made can, and should, be transmogrified into valuable lessons learned.
Pandemics Are In The Air
Diana Hopkins
April 7, 2010
Lightning strikes are sudden and spectacular, highly visible, and extremely violent. Not to mention lethal. Bacteria and viruses are just the opposite – totally invisible, in fact. But they kill many more people, in every country in the world, year after year than lightning does. It may be helpful to learn a bit more about them – and about how to deal with them.
Using NHSS ‘To Minimize the Risks’
Raphael M. Barishansky
April 7, 2010
There are 10 principal objectives in what has been described as “the first comprehensive policy document” focusing specifically on protecting the health of the American people in times of national emergency – e.g., a major mass-casualty incident such as an earthquake, volcanic eruption, or terrorist attack. Here is a quick look at four of those objectives of particular short-term importance to the domestic-preparedness community.
H1N1: A Lesson for Healthcare Preparedness
Theodore Tully
April 4, 2010
The numerous mistakes, misunderstandings, and miscalculations made in preparing for the potential loss of perhaps millions of lives during the 2009-10 global pandemic that never happened do not represent a total loss. Just the opposite, in fact – if (a very big if) political decision makers, emergency managers, and healthcare providers learn from those mistakes, correct the miscalculations, and clarify the misunderstandings.
