CDC conducts flu epidemic drill
April 29, 2007 by Grace Ibay
Filed under Diseases & Conditions
A war game, if you may. That’s how networks called the 48-hour drill that the US Center of Disease Control conducted this week to test the responses of US government agencies.
In a classic outbreak scenario, the script called for a student infected with a new strain of H5N1 returns from Indonesia and dies, but not before infecting others, including members of a swimming team.
By end of day One, 12 people contracted the disease in four states, and 25 percent die.
By Day Two, the cases double to 25 and the CDC is forced to consider severe control measures – closing schools, banning flights from Indonesia, or even shutting U.S. borders.
The CDC decided against these measures. Instead, they send experts to Indonesia, release a quarter of the U.S. stockpile of flu vaccines and limits all incoming international flights to just 10 US airports to screen passengers and limit the disease’s spread.
This part two of a three-stage flu pandemic drill, the CDC simulated how agencies would marshall its resources and manage the public.
“If we were at the beginning of a pandemic this is exactly what it would look like,” said CDC Director Julie Gerberding at a news conference early in the 48-hour drill, which involved hundreds of officials. “If things turn out wrong it could lead to a “catastrophe beyond our planning,” she said.
The exercise captured the hazardous and difficult decisions that needed to be made quickly in the event of a pandemic.
From a similar exercise back in January, here are issues that need immediate answer and responses:
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1. What other information from Indonesia need gathering? Was it a casual outbreak or were there outbreaks in other parts of the country? Answers to these determine whether the World Health Organization need to mount a mass disctribution of antiviral drugs to contain the virus at the source.
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2. Were there other passengers that got sick in the transcontinental flight the student made? If the pandemic comes in a flu season, more people would be vulnerable to either viruses.
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3. The number of people who might be incubating flu grew by the hour. Who else needs to be quarantined? What about those already infected in other states – what measures of quarantine and control need to be done?
In a final round in May, the virus gets to Atlanta and takes out 40 percent of CDC’s workforce.
[sources: washingtonpost;reuters]
Tags: U.S. CDC, center of disease control and prevention, flu, exercise, drill, pandemic
