Bush to move on pandemic plan
WASHINGTON – President Bush is expected to approve soon a national pandemic influenza response plan that identifies more than 300 specific tasks for federal agencies, from determining which front-line workers should be the first vaccinated to expanding Internet capacity to handle what would likely be a flood of people working from their home computers.
The Treasury Department is poised to sign agreements with other nations to produce currency if U.S. mints cannot operate. The Pentagon, anticipating difficulties acquiring supplies from the Far East, is considering stockpiling millions of latex gloves. And the Department of Veterans Affairs has developed a drive-through medical exam to quickly assess patients who suspect they have been infected.
The document is the first attempt to spell out in some detail how the government would detect and respond to an outbreak and continue functioning through what could be an 18-month crisis, which in a worst-case scenario could kill 1.9 million Americans. Bush was briefed on a draft of the implementation plan on March 17, and he is expected to approve it within the week.
After the ineffectual response to Hurricane Katrina, the White House is eager to show it can manage the medical, security and economic fallout of a major outbreak. In response to questions posed to several federal agencies, White House officials offered a briefing on the near-final version of its 240-page plan. When it is issued, officials intend to announce several vaccine manufacturing contracts to jump-start an industry that has declined in the past few decades.
The background briefing and on-the-record interviews with experts in and out of government reveal that some agencies are far along in preparing for a deadly outbreak. Others have yet to resolve basic questions, such as who is designated an essential employee and how the agency would cope if that person were out of commission.
“Most of the federal government right now is as ill-prepared as any part of society,” said Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.
Many critical decisions remain. Administration scientists are debating how much vaccine would be needed to immunize against a new strain of avian influenza, and they are weighing data that might alter their strategy on who should have priority for antiviral drugs such as Tamiflu and Relenza.
To keep the nation’s 1.8 million federal workers healthy and productive through a pandemic, the Bush administration would tap into its secure stash of medicines, cancel large gatherings, encourage schools to close and shift air traffic controllers to the busier hubs – probably where flu had not yet struck. Retired federal employees would be summoned back to work and National Guard troops could be dispatched to cities facing possible “insurrection,” said Jeffrey Runge, chief medical officer at the Department of Homeland Security.
As Katrina illustrated, a central issue would be “who is ultimately in charge and how the agencies will be coordinated,” said former assistant surgeon general Susan Blumenthal. The Department of Health and Human Services would take the lead on medical aspects, but DHS would have overall authority, she noted. “How are those authorities going to come together?”
Essentially, the president would be in charge, replied the White House official. Bush is expected to adopt post-Katrina recommendations that a new interagency task force coordinate the entire federal response and a high-level Disaster Response Group resolve disputes among agencies or states. Neither entity has been created.