CDC Reports on Emergency Preparedness of States
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued its first ever report on public health preparedness across all states, “Public Health Preparedness: Mobilizing State by State”. The main points noted there include significant strides in emergency preparedness, with room to continue improvements in that area. A press release was issued about the report publication, posted on the CDC website.
Since 2001, groups all across the country have made investments to the systems required to respond to both emergencies and health hazards. States have all developed emergency response plans. Included in that, states identified means to both identify and confirm threats to the health of the public. As well, states have established the means to clarify communication between the many diverse agencies involved in the response to public health emergencies and threats.
Agencies have benefited with the disbursement of more than $5 billion to improve public health preparedness since 2002. According to the CDC Coordinating Office for Terrorism Preparedness and Emergency Response, the nation is in a better overall position to respond to public health threats. Nonetheless, these efforts must continue.
The data included in the report assesses the status of health departments across the country in terms of their ability to investigate and detect diseases and the capabilities of their laboratories. An additional assessment completed considered the ability of the state health departments to plan, execute, and respond to public health emergencies.
Notable improvements across the public health departments include the ability to receive urgent reports at any time. In 1999, only twelve states had this 24-7 capability. States are also able to share information through the Epidemic Information Exchange (Epi-X). This is a system run by the CDC to help monitor for disease outbreaks. The number of users from 2001 to 2006 increased more than three-fold.
In addition, the number of public laboratories has doubled since 2001. All states now have extensive emergency response plans to address potential hazards such as pandemic flu. Related, states have plans for the distribution of medical supplies and treatments from the National Stockpile.
These improvements are noteworthy, but there are still opportunities for improvement. Some of the challenges noted in the report include the means to rapidly disseminate medicines and vaccines to communities affected by disease. Electronic health data needs to be increasingly integrated with network surveillance systems to support preparedness and response ability.
February 27, 2008 Related topics: Infectious Diseases, General Management & Administration, Trends