Volunteers needed for dispensing exercise

by Mark Dykes

Volunteers are needed to help with a Hot Springs County mass dispensing exercise hosted by Hot Springs County Public Health. The exercise is scheduled for the morning of Thursday, April 13 at the county fair building. The scenario is a release of weaponized Anthrax.

Volunteers can choose to be staff or role-players during. Staff volunteers who want to help at the Point of Dispensing (POD) should arrive at the building by 8 a.m. to receive a short training before the POD opens at 9 a.m. Staff volunteers should plan on being at the exercise until noon.

Those who want to be "players" only need about 5-10 minutes and can come any time 9-11 a.m. There is no need to sign up before hand, and players are welcome to bring their children. Anyone can be a player and will take the role of people who were exposed. As part of the exercise, they will fill out a short form using fake names and fake health information.

Players fill out the form and go through the stations set up in the fair building. For the purpose of the exercise, candy will be given out instead of actual pill bottles.

This is entirely a Public Health exercise. Public Health is the lead agency for the mass dispensing operations in any US county, and all counties are required by the Centers for Disease Control to have thorough and viable mass dispensing plans, and the volunteers to support their mission, which is to dispense medication to the entire population within 48 hours of an outbreak or release of a dangerous agent.

Mary Gordon with Hot Springs County Public Health explained the CDC’s Strategic National Stockpile (SNS) is national repository of medical supplies, with caches stationed all over the country to allow for quick deployment in the event of a health emergency, terrorist attack or manmade incident.

Twelve-hour Push Packages containing pharmaceuticals, antidotes and medical equipment are the first deployment of supplies. The packages are positioned in strategically located, secure warehouses ready for immediate release within 12 hours of the federal decision to deploy SNS assets.

A major part of SNS planning is mass dispensing of medical countermeasures, a task taken on by local County Public Health offices. A POD site is a federally instituted best practice model designed to provide medications, vaccines or medical supplies to a large community of healthy people during a health emergency.

The POD sites are locations familiar and easily accessible to the community, and are designed to serve as a place for the public to receive medications, vaccines and medical supplies. The ultimate goal of a POD is to quickly provide such items to a large number of people in a short amount of time.

The SNS was deployed during the 2009 swine flu pandemic, as well as the Zika virus outbreak last year, the Ebola and botulism outbreak of 2014 and 2015, hurricanes during the past 12 years and the World Trade Center and Anthrax attacks of 2001.

During next week’s exercise, Gordon said, the candy given out will be treated as real antibiotics, and as if this were an actual Anthrax release, with people who are healthy but exposed. In the 2001 attacks, she noted, people were unaware Anthrax been weaponized so many were showing up in hospitals with flu-like symptoms and pneumonia before being diagnosed with an Anthrax infection. Today, we know preventative antibiotics are key in stopping the infection.

Those interested in being staff volunteers can contact Gordon at the Public Health Office, 864-3311 or 864-8074, or email mary.gordon@wyo.gov