Months Before Hurricane, a Warning
- From: "Halcitron" <halcitron@xxxxxxx>
- Date: 26 Sep 2005 21:24:26 -0700
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20050926163009990002&_mpc=news%2e10%2e1&cid=842
Months Before Hurricane, a Warning
Review Said Homeland Security Dept. Was Unprepared
By CHERYL WITTENAUER, AP
(Sept. 26) - Eight months before the devastation of hurricanes Katrina
and Rita, an internal Homeland Security Department review warned that
the nation was woefully unprepared for a medical disaster and lacked a
coherent plan for taking charge of mass casualties.
KRT
"The nation's medical leadership works in isolation, its medical
response capability is fragmented and ill-prepared to deal with a mass
casualty event," the review says.
Government medical teams had difficulty coordinating and delivering
help during 2004 hurricanes in Florida, said the report obtained by The
Associated Press. The report also said there was inadequate planning
for dealing with a surge of patients during a disaster like a
biological or nuclear attack.
It called for creation of a uniformed medical reserve corps, including
specialists, fashioned after the National Guard.
"The nation's medical leadership works in isolation, its medical
response capability is fragmented and ill-prepared to deal with a mass
casualty event and ... DHS lacks an adequate medical support capability
for its field operating units," said the report.
Homeland Security officials said the problems identified in the Jan. 3
report were in the process of being addressed when the hurricanes hit.
Secretary Michael Chertoff was reorganizing his department and created
a new chief medical officer to take the lead on preparedness, they
said.
"I thought it (the report) was a great place to start," said Dr.
Jeffrey Runge, the department's new medical officer who started his job
after Katrina. "Most people in the medical community who are concerned
about readiness, preparedness, disaster medicine and so forth felt
pretty much the same way."
But the report's author, St. Louis transplant surgeon Jeffrey Lowell,
told AP he doesn't believe DHS has implemented enough changes yet, and
that the current system of volunteer disaster medical teams was "pretty
much shot" when called upon to respond to a second disaster after
Katrina.
Lowell also said he was startled when then-Federal Emergency Management
Agency chief Mike Brown strongly rejected the ideas Lowell had proposed
earlier this year. "He rejected the methodology, the message, the
conclusion and the recommendations," Lowell said. "He disagreed with
every single everything."
Brown, who resigned from FEMA earlier this month amid blistering
criticism of his stewardship of the government's response to Katrina,
did not return repeated phone calls to his cell phone seeking comment.
AP
Dr. Jeffrey Lowell said FEMA Director Mike Brown, who has since
resigned, rejected his report.
Lowell said Brown didn't want him to give the report to then-Homeland
Security Secretary Tom Ridge. But Lowell, who was hired by Ridge to
conduct the review, said Ridge heartily welcomed its conclusions and
recommendations.
"If people want to tweak it, great. Let's get on with this and move
forward quickly," Lowell said, urging that more recommendations be
implemented.
Chertoff took over a month after the report was issued and ordered a
further review of medical preparedness. He then reorganized the
department, creating a new undersecretary for preparedness and Runge's
job.
"There are parts of that report that are absolutely unanimous with what
the (medical) community has been saying, and other parts of the report
that are very specific organizational things that are not really what
Secretary Chertoff has in mind," Runge said.
The report, entitled "Medical Readiness Responsibilities and
Capabilities: A Strategy for Realigning and Strengthening the Federal
Medical Response," concluded:
-National Disaster Medical System teams often are deployed without full
preparation for the disasters they are handling. "Recent deployments to
Florida following the 2004 hurricanes confirmed critical shortfalls in
doctrine, training, logistics support and coordination."
-It was "imperative" that the department realign its resources and
create the job of an assistant secretary of medical readiness.
What would you do?
· Find Your States' Emergency Plan
http://www.governmentguide.com/govsite.adp?bread=*Main&url=http%3A//www.governmentguide.com/ams/clickThruRedirect.adp%3F55076483%2C43572771%2Chttp%3A//www.fema.gov/fema/statedr.shtm
-Conflicts in legislation, a presidential directive and the National
Response Plan must be reconciled to eliminate overlapping
responsibilities and authorities - and questions about who takes
charge. "Politically adversarial turf wars between (Homeland Security)
and (Health and Human Services) and similar battles between
organizational units within DHS threaten DHS' ability to lead effective
medical response in the event of a national medical event."
-There is "significant concern" that the government lacks a single
coordination point for local emergency medical services in communities.
-The nation lacks a "systemwide strategy" for handling a massive surge
of patients. "The ability to provide care to large numbers of
casualties following a major incident remains one of the greater
challenges and vulnerabilities," it said.
Elin Gursky, a public health and biodefense specialist at the
Arlington, Va.-based think tank, ANSER, said the nation is "quite
conclusively" not prepared to protect people from harm and mitigate
disasters.
"We still don't know who's in charge, and until we do, people will
hesitate to act. The assumption is that someone else is in charge," she
said.
09-26-05 15:54 EDT
Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. The information contained in the
AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise
distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated
Press. All active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL.
end
When in doubt, "I am in charge, until relieved."
:/
Halcitron
:/
.
- Prev by Date: Re: Lesson on 72 hour kits
- Next by Date: Re: What pack for bugout bag?
- Previous by thread: New post a CSR
- Next by thread: Re: 200,000 protest war
- Index(es):
Relevant Pages
|
Loading
