Sept/Oct 2006 - Volume 5, Issue 5

Rescue Riders Biker Group and
Kane County (IL) Medical Reserves Corp
Join Forces

The mood was congenially serious Thursday evening, October 5, 2006, as Kane County Medical Reserve Corps’ (MRC) paramedics taught basic first aid to a dozen volunteer motorcycle-rider members of “Rescue Riders”. Kane County MRC Coordinator Pat DeMoon had earlier contacted “Biker4Biker”charity group founder Dean Akey about an idea: training motorcycle riders to make use of their increased mobility in the event of a natural disaster or terrorist attack. DeMoon reasoned: “What better group than bikers who are already helping people?” Akey wholeheartedly embraced the idea, which led to the formation of the Rescue Riders organization and the subsequent MRC-sponsored training session.

The Kane County (IL) Medical Reserve Corps (MRC) is itself a fairly new organization, emerging after September 11, 2001, in response to the arrival of 40,000 unaffiliated volunteers’ arrival to New York City. DeMoon explains: “You can imagine that the first responders there had their hands full with other problems because of the bombings, and now they have 40,000 unaffiliated people who want to help, descending on New York where there are no toilet facilities, no food to feed these people, a myriad of problems.”

DeMoon continues: “At the time, President Bush thought we needed to organize some formal system to bring volunteers together to assist in other eventualities, either a terrorist attack or natural disasters.” The result was formation of hundreds of MRCs throughout the United States to prepare for the medical aspect of disasters. The Kane County MRC claims to be one of the first MRCs in the nation and today boasts some 200 medical and public health volunteers (see accompanying article “Kane County (IL) Medical Reserve Corps: Progress Forging Community Medical Preparedness”).

The Kane County MRC-Rescue Riders course was held at Trinity Christian Vineyard Fellowship (St. Charles, IL) in space generously provide by long-time Vineyard Pastor Dan Rak, who is also a volunteer with the Kane County MRC.

Akey envisions the Rescue Riders group growing to about 100 bikers trained in basic first aid and cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) to support medical first responders, such as doctors, nurses, and paramedics, by providing, augmented transport capability and comfort to the worried well, among other support functions.

The Rescue Riders organization is a dynamic work-in-progress. Akey foresees that bikers who join Rescue Riders and successfully traverse an established curriculum may join the Kane County MRC or another MRC closer to their homes.

Akey also predicts a program in which Rescue Riders continuously improve their navigation and geographic skills to contribute to community disaster relief efforts. For example, bikers carrying needed medical supplies who know the myriad roads and pathways in a stricken region may efficiently negotiate between Points A and B separated by traffic jams, floodwaters, fallen buildings, or other hazards.

Veteran Paramedic John Guglielmo and Paramedic-Nurse Belinda Guglielmo taught the Basic First Aid course to the gathered Rescue Riders. They challenged the wide-awake attendees with realistic and original case scenarios, enhanced by expert moulaging (theatrical make-up to simulate injuries and medical conditions) and theatrical-quality acting.

Bikers interested in finding out more about volunteering for the Rescue Riders program are encouraged to visit the Biker4Biker Web site at www.biker4biker.org (accessed October 8, 2006).

Medical personnel (e.g., physicians, dentists, pharmacists, nurses, paramedics, mental health professionals) who are interested in learning more about volunteering with the Kane County Medical Reserve Corps are encouraged to visit http://www.medicalreservecorps.gov/index.cfm?MRCaction=MRCUnit.Profile&id=77 (accessed October 8, 2006).

Kane County (IL) Medical Reserve Corps:
Progress Forging Community Medical Preparedness

The Kane County Medical Reserve Corps is one of 489 local units (as of October 7, 2006) comprised of medical and public health professional units organized in 10 MRC regions in the United States. (1-2) President George W. Bush founded the MRC program in 2002. He, like many other observers in the public and private sectors, became acutely aware of the outpouring of offers of volunteer aid in the days and weeks following the September 11, 2001 attacks, and the dearth of organizations prepared to put the volunteers to work.

The Medical Reserve Corps (MRC) program resides organizationally in the Office of the US Surgeon General, US Public Health Service, Department of Health and Human Services. The current national director of the MRC is Commander Robert J. Tosatto, who holds a bachelor’s degree in pharmacy as well as an MPH and an MBA, and has served in many capacities in the US Public Health System, both domestically and abroad, since 1988. (3) Commander Tosatto is responsible for overseeing the establishment, implementation, and coordination of MRCs in communities nationwide, and serves under Kenneth P. Moritsugu, MD, MPH, acting US surgeon general since the departure of Richard Carmona, MD, MPH, in July 2006. (3)

The idea behind creating the MRC program is simple: communities recruit teams of local citizens to help provide information and basic medical services in a mass emergency when first responders and hospitals are likely to be overwhelmed. The Bush administration in September 2002 accepted applications for, and then awarded, grants of $50,000 each year for three-year demonstration projects to 42 communities in 26 states. Kane County, Illinois, led by long-time Executive Director Mary Lou England, R.N., M.S., was one of those early communities in receipt of a federal grant. (4-5) Three other communities in Illinois that received the first set of grants were Oak Park, Peoria, and Winnebago County.

Kane County is located in the far western suburbs of Chicago, Illinois, and is a member of MRC Region V, which includes IL, IN, MI, MN, OH, and WI. Kane County is a semi-rural AND a semi-urban county (two large cities, Aurora and Elgin), and is experiencing very rapid growth. Its current population is more than 400,000 residents (2000 census). (6) The initial Kane County MRC coordinator Laura Andersen estimated the need during an emergency for several hundred medical professional volunteers who were not already designated first responders. Medical immunity for these professionals in the event they were called up became a much-discussed issue. (7) Andersen believed that once the malpractice issue got settled, more health professionals would agree to volunteer.

The regional coordinator of MRC Region V is Roohi Husain, MSW, a social worker by professional background, and previously associated with UNICEF where she served as the national coordinator for the Zambian Universal Child Immunization campaign. Her job is to provide technical assistance and support to the existing MRC units within her region, and help people interested in the MRC program to start a unit where none presently exists. (8)

Kane County’s MRC is thriving today under its current coordinator, retired hospital administrator veteran Patrick DeMoon. (9) The roster of current MRC volunteers includes 13 physicians, 5 physician assistants, 1 nurse practitioner, 40 registered nurses, 2 licensed practical nurses, 5 pharmacist, 1 mental health professional, 12 EMT-paramedics, 3 dentists, 4 veterinarians, 32 public health workers, 2 “other medical”, 4 “other public health”, and 72 other non-medical/public health (total 196). (10) A refreshing goal of the Kane County MRC stated on its website is “to help the public become comfortable with taking care of themselves during a disaster (natural or terrorist).” (10)

To provide the hundreds of MRC units with resources and direction, and to tie them together as a more unified force, the US Public Health System and the National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO), a not-for profit organization that represents the nation’s 2850 local health agencies, have joined forces to generate a list of “core competencies” or “standards” “encouraged” for adoption by all MRC volunteers (published April 2006). (11) The final list includes eight core competencies as follows:

“1. Describe the procedure and steps necessary for the MRC member to protect health, safety, and overall well-being of themselves [sic], their [sic] families, the team, and the community. 2. Document that the MRC member has a personal and family preparedness plan in place. 3. Describe the chain of command (e.g., Emergency Management Systems, ICS, NIMS). 4. Describe the role of the local MRC, and its application to a given incident. 5. Describe the MRC member’s communication role(s) and processes with response partners, media, general public, and others. 6. Describe the impact of an event on the mental health of the MRC member, responders, and others. 7. Demonstrate the MRC member’s ability to follow procedures for assignment, activation, reporting, and deactivation. 8. Identify limits to own skills, knowledge, and abilities as they pertain to MRC role(s).” (12)

To further strengthen the ties between the MRC program and US Public Health System at all levels, a “Cooperative Agreement” between NACCHO and the MRC program began in August-September 2006. The three objectives of this Cooperative Agreement, a work in progress, are as follows:

“1. Promote the MRC through NACCHO networks. NACCHO will promote the visibility of the MRC to public health leaders and practitioners by including MRC information in NACCHO’s newsletters, organizing MRC-related sessions for conferences, conducting online training for health departments about working with the MRC, and developing a national MRC newsletter.

2. Support MRC operations with capacity-building assistance. NACCHO will provide travel scholarships for attendance at regional and national MRC meetings, and capacity-development ‘mini-grants’ to new and existing MRC units. NACCHO, MRC regional coordinators and the MRC program office are currently working together to develop eligibility criteria, an application process, time line, and dissemination plan for funds. NACCHO will also continue to provide assistance with the implementation of core competences for volunteers and the planning for regional meetings.

3. Support the development of the public health service auxiliary concept. NACCHO will collaborate with MRC and PHS [US Public Health System] leaders on the development of a concept of operations and a guidance manual for members. A demonstration project will be developed and evaluated. NACCHO will facilitate cross-training exercises with PHS teams as part of the demonstration project.” (13)

All MRCs, regardless of where they may be housed organizationally, are eligible to apply for “capacity building assistance” funding. The MRC program national headquarters has issued a detailed “Pandemic Flu Planning document for MRC Personnel” available online. (14) Additional information on NACCHO is available elsewhere. (15)

Sources:

1. Office of the US Surgeon General: “Medical Reserve Corps”: available online at: http://www.medicalreservecorps.gov/HomePage; accessed October 6, 2006.

2. “MRC Unit” at: http://www.medicalreservecorps.gov/index.cfm?MRCaction=MRCunit.Contact#Illinois; accessed October 6, 2006.

3. “Commander Robert J. Tosatto appointed new MRC program director” , December 1, 2003. Available at: http://www.medicalreservecorps.gov/NewsEvents/2003/CDRTosattoNewProgramDirectorTosatta; accessed October 7, 2006.

4. Fox Valley in 60 seconds” in Daily Herald, p. 3, August 30, 2002.

5. “Emergency medical team to be created” in Daily Herald, p. 3, November 19, 2002.

6. Michael McCoy: “Guiding the County through Local Disaster: The Role of a County Board Chairman” in “The First 72 Hours” (M. O’Leary, ed.), pp. 285-292.

7. Melanie Kirkpatrick: “Al Qaeda and the Plaintiff's Bar” in
The Wall Street Journal via Dow Jones, July 14, 2003; available online at:

http://www.kanehealth.com/mr_news.htm; accessed October 7, 2006.

8. Biography of M. Roohi Husain at: http://www.medicalreservecorps.gov/index.cfm?MRCaction=MRCUnit.Husain; accessed October 7, 2006.

9.Patrick DeMoon, 1240 N. Highland Avenue, Aurora, IL 60506, (630) 232-5811.

10. Kane County MRC website at: http://www.medicalreservecorps.gov/index.cfm?MRCaction=MRCUnit.Profile&id=77; accessed October 7, 2006.

11. List of work group participants available at: http://www.naccho.org/topics/environmental/documents/MRCWorkGroupParticipants.doc; accessed October 7, 2006.

12. NACCHO: “MRC Core Competencies for the medical reserve corps [sic]” available at: http://www.naccho.org/topics/emergency/documents/MRCFactSheetApril20064.pdf
#search='naccho%20and%20mrc%20core%20competencies'; accessed October 7, 2006.

13. NACCHO-MRC Capacity Building Cooperative Agreement is available at:

http://www.medicalreservecorps.gov/File/MRC_Cooperative_Agreement_FAQ.pdf; accessed October 7, 2006.

14. “Pandemic Flu Guidance for MRC Units” available at: http://www.medicalreservecorps.gov/File/MRC_Pandemic_Influenza_Planning_Guidance.pdf; accessed October 7, 2006.

15. SEMP Biot #138: “American Public Health Accreditation Movement” (12November2004) available at: http://www.semp.us/biots/biot_138.html; accessed October 7, 2006.

16. SEMP Biot #87: “Strategic National Stockpile Deployment and the Tyranny of Logistics” (June 8, 2004) available at: http://www.semp.us/biots/biot87.html; accessed October 7, 2006.

17. “NACCHO” at: http://www.naccho.org/; accessed October 7, 2006.

Naperville (IL) New Emergency Operations Center and CERT Program:
Progress Forging Community Critical Services Preparedness

The following dialogue occurred between Pete Smith, Naperville emergency preparedness manager, and Margaret O’Leary, mid-August, 2006. It has been edited for publication.

Please update us on how the City of Naperville (Illinois) is progressing in addressing the needs of the public in the event of a pandemic.

Pete Smith: In preparing for a pandemic, the staff of the City of Naperville are working hard to educate the public BEFORE a pandemic occurs and to develop public information documents to distribute information should a pandemic actually occur.

In the public education arena, we have developed an emergency preparedness guide available online for families that shows how to develop an emergency plan, how to develop a family disaster supply kit, and how do in-place sheltering, among other things (see: http://www.naperville.il.us/emplibrary/04EPGuide.pdf; accessed October 4, 2006).

To keep the municipal government functioning during a pandemic, we have built and outfitted the Naperville Emergency Operations Center (completed six months ago) where we keep a minimal amount of food and water but have strong existing arrangements with suppliers to obtain more water and food in very short order, for example, if we see an epidemic changing into a pandemic. We anticipate that a pandemic situation will be a slow-moving disaster, which will allow us some time to obtain necessities from our suppliers. We ARE stocking up on things like N95 masks because we anticipate that they will be very difficult to obtain when they are needed during an epidemic or pandemic. Citywide, we are currently installing waterless hand sanitizers in the work places. Not only will these be helpful during a pandemic, they will be helpful during the regular flu season.

In the public information arena, we are working on developing public releases in the form of pre-planning information based on the stages of a pandemic flu—one statement for if it starts developing, another statement if it gets into the bird population of the United States, and a third statement if it gets into the human population. We are coordinating our efforts with DuPage County, which has done quite a bit in pandemic preparedness public education already. Will County is just about ready to release information on its part [Naperville is in both DuPage and Will Counties]. Both are currently setting up websites to provide information to the public.

Pandemic preparedness planning SHOULD be coming out of the county-level health agencies, because THEY are the designated lead agency on the public health aspect of pandemic flu preparedness. And pandemic flu is a public health problem. The City of Naperville will refer Naperville residents to county health resources and also will recirculate information during the different stages of a pandemic, if and when they occur.

The City of Naperville is NOT in the health business. We’re in the business of providing critical services to the public and that is where our disaster preparedness plan is very strong. I know that DuPage County has made a large effort in pandemic preparedness planning and it is a work in progress for them. Staff of Will County are also working hard on their pandemic preparedness planning. Furthermore, the two counties are working together so that the public hears a uniform message from both.

It’s important for the public to know what a pandemic is, how it travels, how it is transmitted, and what you can do reduce your chances of getting it, such as washing your hands and performing good basic hygiene. Further, if it ever does become a reality, we [City of Naperville] will provide additional information and also CURRENT information as to what is going on—for example, whether antivirals are available, where you go to get them, and what else you should be doing. We are acutely aware that all of this information needs to be put out on a CONSISTENT basis and tied together.

You are absolutely right. The City of Naperville is not in the health business. But if I were a Naperville resident and a health emergency struck the community, I would naturally turn to my city government leaders to meet my needs and questions because they are familiar to me. I would be less likely to turn to the county government leaders, because they are farther away and I would assume that they would be very busy meeting the needs of the dozens of communities they service. Disaster research has shown repeatedly that during a crisis, most people go to the leadership source with whom they are most familiar. They don’t suddenly develop new behaviors during a disaster, like talking with unfamiliar people in a higher level of government or traveling to relatively unfamiliar places farther away to obtain necessities.

I don’t think it will take long for people to realize that there is going to have to be a paradigm shift during a public health disaster such as a pandemic. Naperville prides itself on being the go-to source on most types of information but a pandemic flu disaster is a whole different animal in that it is worldwide in scope and people will have to be re-educated as to where they have to go to get that information. Very frankly, we are not in the health business in the City of Naperville. In some parts of the country there are local [municipal] health departments but around here, that function is performed by the county health departments. That is where people will need to go for their main source of information.

Does Naperville have a CERT program?

Yes. We started up a CERT program in Naperville in 2005. CERT stands for the “Community Emergency Response Team”. It is part of the Citizen Corps Program (http://www.citizencorps.gov/; accessed October 4, 2006), which is a program of the US Department of Homeland Security. The City of Naperville saw the CERT program as a good opportunity to get citizens involved in the community and to develop a source of organized volunteers in the event of a large emergency. The purpose of CERT is twofold: first, to educate citizens on what to do in the case of an emergency in their home, neighborhood, or workplace and what to do in that period of time between when the incident occurs and professional responders are able to show up. Many times in a disaster, such as a tornado, it takes time for emergency responders to reach an affected area because of downed trees and blocked roads.

CERT training involves a 20-hour basic course based on a curriculum that has been developed by the Department of Homeland Security (see: https://www.citizencorps.gov/cert/training_mat.shtm; accessed October 4, 2006). The course is available to people who either live or work in Naperville. It teaches basic first aid, basic search and rescue, and basic firefighting skills, and has segments on disasters in general and terrorism, among others. The course provides enough information so that people will have enough confidence that if they are stricken they would be able to intelligently take some action to deal with the situation. One example is teaching people how to SAFELY turn off utilities in their home--that’s always a problem during disaster situations when there are burst gas lines and downed power lines.

The secondary function of the CERT program is to provide an organized group of citizen volunteers who are able to step up in an emergency situation and help the community that sponsors them by providing resources to go out and accomplish various tasks.

One of the nice things about the program is that it is very flexible and depending on the needs of the community, the CERT volunteers can be trained to basic level or a higher level or something inbetween to meet the needs of the community. As an example, in a more rural area where they don’t have a police department and rely on county or state law enforcement, or if they have an all-volunteer fire department or they contract with a fire department in the next town, these CERT volunteers become a resource in the community where they function almost like first responders.

In a city like Naperville where we have tremendous resources both in our city and through the various mutual aid agreements in emergency management, police, and fire, the need is not there for CERT volunteers to function as first responders. Instead they are needed to do other kinds of things in case of an emergency, such as helping in a shelter, working at a medication distribution site in the event of a bioterrorism event to check people in and fill out paper work, things like that. They could also be called out to help the police department search for a lost or missing person, such as an elderly person who has walked away from a nursing home. So training varies from community to community. Our Citizen Corp Council in Naperville has identified community education as a need they would like to help to address. So I think they are going to become a larger part of public outreach to the community. Many of the people who are involved in our CERT program would like to go into the community to educate on people on preparedness issues.

The CERT program in Naperville is in its infancy because we haven’t been around that long! We did a pilot program in early 2005 made up of a number of volunteers from some of our other volunteer programs, such as the emergency management Community Radio Watch (http://www.napervillecrw.org/), and our Citizen Police Academy (http://www.naperville.il.us/dynamic_content.aspx?id=309; accessed October 4, 2006) and Citizen Fire Academy. A lot of those people are staying on as the core group.

We ran our first publicly-advertised class in spring 2006 (http://www.naperville.il.us/dynamic_content.aspx?id=1806; accessed October 4, 2006] and 20 people graduated from that class. In October 2006 we are starting our second class and up to 30 people will be in that one. We are planning to sponsor three classes each year. As those groups go through, they are going to receive refresher and additional skills training; the first refresher course is scheduled for September 2006. We have found that the folks who go through the class are very, very eager to learn more. They want to be involved, they want to help the community, and we we’re trying to facilitate that.

Who are the instructors for the CERT basic courses in Naperville?

For our first pilot course, the instructors came from the police department, the fire department, and the public utilities department who had gone through the week-long “Train the Trainer” program sponsored by the State of Illinois Emergency Management Agency (IEMA) a number of times during the year. Our trainers now are CERT volunteers who have been trained in the State of Illinois training program.

Please describe Naperville’s experience in the National Incident Management System training.

In the process of doing the required NIMS training in 2005 we had about 800 municipal employees go through the IS700 course--“Introduction to the National Incident Management System” (see: http://training.fema.gov/EMIWeb/IS/is700.asp; accessed October 4, 2006). There are between 1000 and 1100 municipal employees total. The requirement is that anyone who would be a part of your emergency response plan needs to pass the course. That would include police, fire, public works, public utilities, people who would find themselves at the EOC, the dispatch center, staffing phone lines dealing specifically with emergency training. The people who haven’t got through it are people with strictly clerical functions or support functions who are not involved in the emergency plan at all.

In 2006, everyone who took the IS700 course had to take the IS100 course—“Introduction to Incident Command” (see: http://training.fema.gov/EMIWeb/IS/is100.asp; accessed October 4, 2006). We’re in the process of putting everyone through it.

Who teaches IS700 and IS100 courses to Naperville employees?

We have fire personnel primarily teaching the IS100 and the IS200 courses. A lot of the courses are also online through the Department of Homeland Security (Emergency Management Institute).

What’s the IS200 course?

The IS200 course is “Basic Incident Command” (see: http://training.fema.gov/EMIWeb/IS/is200.asp; accessed October 4, 2006). It is required of supervisors. There are two more levels—the IS300 and the IS400 levels, which are scheduled for next year.

Says who?

Says the Department of Homeland Security.

Who will be required to go through IS300 and IS400 courses?

Middle management and above. Then there is the IS-800 course, which is the introduction to the National Response Plan (see: http://www.training.fema.gov/EMIWeb/IS/is800.asp; accessed October 4, 2006).
We are running two courses on it and it is also available online. That course is required for top management.

Has anyone in top management in Naperville completed IS-800 yet?

I have taken the course with the Illinois Emergency Services Management Association (IESMA—see: http://www.iesma.org/default.aspx; accessed October 4, 2006), which was held in Peoria, Illinois. There were about 40 people in the course—emergency managers, some police, and some fire people. The course takes about 1 ½ hours.

Thank you very much.

We see some of that coming out of various agencies now, such as educating families to stock up on certain things, such as a minimum of 72 hours or now, even up to several weeks, worth of food and water. We keep a minimal amount of food and water here in the emergency preparedness center, but we have existing arrangements with suppliers to obtain more in short order, if we see an epidemic changing into a pandemic. We anticipate that a pandemic situation will be a slow-moving disaster, which will allow us time to obtain necessities from our suppliers. We ARE stocking up on things like N95 masks because we anticipate that they will be very difficult to obtain when they are needed during an epidemic or pandemic. Citywide, we are currently installing waterless hand sanitizers in the work places. Not only will these be helpful during a pandemic, they will be helpful during the regular flu season.

How are you preparing your employees for pandemic flu?

From what we understand, there will be no vaccines available in a pandemic flu situation for some time—at least six months at the earlier--because the flu strain must first be identified, and then the vaccine must be developed, tested, and rolled out in large quantities. Tamiflu [an antiviral medication] availability is being worked on through the federal government and down through the states and local health departments, and is still a work in progress. We’re relying on foreign manufacturers for Tamiflu, so right now we’re not planning on having much or even any available for the public or the responders.

We are coming to realize that there are very serious pandemics and minor ones that come and go. The toll from the “Asian flu” in 1957, for example, was, proportionate to the population number, the same toll that we have today with normal seasonal flu. And there can be pandemic situations anywhere inbetween a very serious one and a minor one.

Illinois College of Emergency Physicians Hold Successful
Disaster Preparedness Conference in Chicago August 1, 2006

On Tuesday, August 1, 2006, in downtown Chicago, approximately 175 physicians, nurses, emergency medical technicians, health physicists, among other professionals from the state of Illinois gathered at the Fairmont Hotel to attend the Illinois College of Emergency Physicians (ICEP)-sponsored emergency preparedness conference titled “On Our Watch IV: Disaster, Terrorism, Pandemic.”

Among the strong list of dynamic speakers were:

• Brantley Tilman Jolly, Jr., MD, associate medical officer for preparedness in the Office of the Chief Medical Officer, Department of Homeland Security, who spoke about the DHS medical role in national preparedness, as described elsewhere (http://www.semp.us/biots/biot_384.html; accessed October 8, 2006);

• Colonel Jill Morgenthaler, former head of safety at Argonne National Laboratory (IL) and currently deputy chief of staff for public safety in the Office of the Governor of Illinois, Rod Blagojevich, who spoke about her experiences overseeing the following agencies in Illinois: Illinois Emergency Management Agency, Illinois Terrorist Task Force, Illinois Air and Army Guard, and Office of the State Fire Marshall;

• Stacy Messina, RN, critical care nurse with Ochsner Clinic Foundation in New Orleans, Louisiana, who spoke about her memorable professional experiences in the 2006 Katrina disaster; and

• Roy Alson, PhD, MD, associate professor and practicing emergency physician in the Wake Forest University Department of Emergency Medicine, as well as commander of a disaster medical assistance team—North Carolina-1, about his considerable experience working in disaster zones during the past decade, as described elsewhere (http://www.semp.us/biots/biot_386.html; accessed October 8, 2006).

Two take-away messages from the conference were: 1. The Department of Homeland Security for good reasons is the lead agency in a pandemic flu disaster, not the Department of Health and Human Services (see http://www.semp.us/biots/biot_384.html); and 2. Disaster medicine is primary care medicine (http://www.semp.us/biots/biot_386.html).

Illinois Bioterrorism Summit 2006:
Partners Sustaining the Heartland

This annual Illinois conference, initiated following September 11, 2001, by the State of Illinois Public Health Department (IDPH) and the Illinois Public Health Association, once again convened hundreds of public health and medical professionals at the Oak Brook Hills Marriott Resort in Oak Brook, Illinois, August 7-9, 2006. IDPH Director Eric E. Whitaker, MD, MPH, was in Africa learning more about HIV, his long-time clinical and research interest, and was therefore unable to attend the opening of the Illinois disaster preparedness conference.

Among the dozens of speakers were keynoter Michael Fagel and deputy director, National Association of County & City Health Officials (NACCHO), Michael Fraser. Fagel, an emergency management consultant, spoke about the need for public health agencies and emergency management agencies to build enduring bridges. Fraser spoke about branding challenges for NACCHO, the potential risks of public agencies’ failure to involve citizens in strengthening disaster preparedness, and the inroads made by Project Public Health Ready (PPHP), a collaborative activity between NACCHO and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Fraser acknowledged a number of Illinois county health departments (Cook, DuPage, Kane, Lake, McHenry, Will, and Winnebago) and the City of Chicago as recognized PPHP local health departments (LHD).