Shiloh
Editor, Senior Moderator
Source: http://www.thehawkeye.com/Story/disaster-drill-061408
published online: 6/14/2008
Drill goes on as water rises
Lee County Emergency Preparedness partners practice response plan for disease.
By WILLIAM SMITH
wsmith@thehawkeye.com
FORT MADISON --
While floodwaters continued to creep toward the downtown area Friday afternoon, 72 volunteers participated in mock disaster drill at Fort Madison High School designed to test Lee County's emergency response plan.
"A small plane has released a kind of material that is an attack on the area," Fort Madison physician David Wenger-Keller told a mock press gathering Saturday morning. "A number of people have begun to develop symptoms."
According to information provided at the press conference, a radical environmentalist group, "Anti-Farming Commoners" used a small yellow and black crop duster to spray a crowd of 400 people attending the Lee County Farm Bureau's Annual Fish Fry Festival on Lake Cooper.
Two days later, a 46-year-old man arrived at the Fort Madison Community Hospital complaining of fever, chills, headache, muscle aches, joint pain and cough.
As patients with similar symptoms continued to pour into the hospital over the next two days, state and local health departments determined that the bacteria released was francisella tularensis, which causes an infection known at tularemia.
About 200 cases of the infection are reported each year, and it can be fatal if not treated with the appropriate antibiotics.
"It occurs normally in nature," Wenger-Keller said. "It's in rabbits and in mud and water."
The drill was designed to give Lee County Emergency Preparedness partners an opportunity to evaluate emergency response plans and capabilities.
"It gives us an opportunity to protect our citizens with skills we would use in a real life event," said Julie Schilling with the Lee County Health Department.
Due to flooding concerns, however, the Lee County Sheriff's Department, Salvation Army and Lee County EMA did not participate in the exercise.
"When we have real emergencies, they need to be elsewhere," Schilling said.
Part of the drill was designed to test the health department's point of dispensing clinic in the school gymnasium, where the 72 volunteers infected with bacteria were able to receive antibiotics.
In a real disaster, the POD clinic would dispense medication in a large-scale disease outbreak like the pandemic flu.
Arlean Rockhold of Warsaw, Ill., who volunteered as one of the infected residents, considered the drill a success.
"I think this is a great thing to do," she said. "Everyone did their job well."
Much of the process for Rockhold and the other volunteers simply involved standing in line and waiting for health screenings and medication. Rockhold, a teacher at Midwest Academy in Keokuk, also brought along 10 of her students.
"One of them pretended to faint, and I went through the line twice," Rockhold said with a grin.
Her only critique was the politeness exhibited by participating members of the Lee County Health Department. She said that being nice is a luxury that probably couldn't be afforded in a real-life crisis.
"They shouldn't have to listen to us whine," she said.
After the exercise ended, volunteers and personal were treated to lunch by the American Red Cross. Other agencies that participated in the exercise included the Keokuk Area Hospital, Fort Madison fire and police departments and the Keokuk Fire Department.
published online: 6/14/2008
Drill goes on as water rises
Lee County Emergency Preparedness partners practice response plan for disease.
By WILLIAM SMITH
wsmith@thehawkeye.com
FORT MADISON --
While floodwaters continued to creep toward the downtown area Friday afternoon, 72 volunteers participated in mock disaster drill at Fort Madison High School designed to test Lee County's emergency response plan.
"A small plane has released a kind of material that is an attack on the area," Fort Madison physician David Wenger-Keller told a mock press gathering Saturday morning. "A number of people have begun to develop symptoms."
According to information provided at the press conference, a radical environmentalist group, "Anti-Farming Commoners" used a small yellow and black crop duster to spray a crowd of 400 people attending the Lee County Farm Bureau's Annual Fish Fry Festival on Lake Cooper.
Two days later, a 46-year-old man arrived at the Fort Madison Community Hospital complaining of fever, chills, headache, muscle aches, joint pain and cough.
As patients with similar symptoms continued to pour into the hospital over the next two days, state and local health departments determined that the bacteria released was francisella tularensis, which causes an infection known at tularemia.
About 200 cases of the infection are reported each year, and it can be fatal if not treated with the appropriate antibiotics.
"It occurs normally in nature," Wenger-Keller said. "It's in rabbits and in mud and water."
The drill was designed to give Lee County Emergency Preparedness partners an opportunity to evaluate emergency response plans and capabilities.
"It gives us an opportunity to protect our citizens with skills we would use in a real life event," said Julie Schilling with the Lee County Health Department.
Due to flooding concerns, however, the Lee County Sheriff's Department, Salvation Army and Lee County EMA did not participate in the exercise.
"When we have real emergencies, they need to be elsewhere," Schilling said.
Part of the drill was designed to test the health department's point of dispensing clinic in the school gymnasium, where the 72 volunteers infected with bacteria were able to receive antibiotics.
In a real disaster, the POD clinic would dispense medication in a large-scale disease outbreak like the pandemic flu.
Arlean Rockhold of Warsaw, Ill., who volunteered as one of the infected residents, considered the drill a success.
"I think this is a great thing to do," she said. "Everyone did their job well."
Much of the process for Rockhold and the other volunteers simply involved standing in line and waiting for health screenings and medication. Rockhold, a teacher at Midwest Academy in Keokuk, also brought along 10 of her students.
"One of them pretended to faint, and I went through the line twice," Rockhold said with a grin.
Her only critique was the politeness exhibited by participating members of the Lee County Health Department. She said that being nice is a luxury that probably couldn't be afforded in a real-life crisis.
"They shouldn't have to listen to us whine," she said.
After the exercise ended, volunteers and personal were treated to lunch by the American Red Cross. Other agencies that participated in the exercise included the Keokuk Area Hospital, Fort Madison fire and police departments and the Keokuk Fire Department.