Kansas ranks No. 2 in nation in disaster preparedness study

Washington ? Kansas ranks second in the nation in planning for bioterror attacks and other public health emergencies, a new report finds.

The report by the Trust for America’s Health said Kansas meets nine of 10 indicators of emergency preparedness. Last year, the state met only half the criteria.

“The success that we’ve seen this year is really from the productive partnerships we have with our local health departments, the hospitals and other agencies throughout the state,” said Joe Blubaugh, a spokesman for the Kansas Department of Health and Environment. “We’re really starting to see those dividends pay off.”

Five years after the Sept. 11 terror attacks, much of the country remains ill-prepared to respond to a major public health emergency such as bioterrorism or pandemic flu. Only one state – Oklahoma – met all 10 criteria for full readiness, according to the trust’s report released Tuesday. The group is a nonprofit, nonpartisan public health advocacy organization based in Washington.

The trust’s report initially said Kansas and Oklahoma tied for first, but the group corrected the study Tuesday after Oklahoma provided additional data showing it satisfied all 10 criteria.

Half of all states scored six or less on the scale of 10 indicators. California, Iowa, Maryland and New Jersey were at the bottom, meeting only four of 10 goals.

“The nation is nowhere near as prepared as we should be for bioterrorism, bird flu and other health disasters,” said Jeff Levi, executive director of the trust. “We continue to make progress each year, but it is limited. As a whole, Americans face unnecessary and unacceptable levels of risk.”

Report highlights

¢ The only area in which Kansas failed was its preparedness to distribute vaccines or antidotes in a health disaster.

¢ Half of the states would run out of hospital beds within two weeks of a moderate outbreak – defined as eight to 12 weeks – of pandemic flu. Forty states have a nursing shortage.

“Frankly, we could have lots of hospital beds,” said Jeff Levi, executive director of the Trust for America’s Health, “but if we don’t have health care workers to take care of those beds, we could be in bad shape.”

¢ Only 15 states, along with New York City and Chicago, are prepared to deliver vaccines and medicines quickly from the federal government’s Strategic National Stockpile. This is a repository of medical supplies kept in 12 secret locations across the country.

¢ Eleven states and Washington, D.C., aren’t fully capable of testing for biological threats.

¢ Four states – Iowa, New Jersey, Ohio and Louisiana – don’t test for the flu year-round, which the report said was crucial for tracking a pandemic outbreak.

¢ The trust’s fourth annual report, “Ready or Not? Protecting the Public’s Health from Diseases, Disasters and Bioterrorism,” can be accessed at www.healthyamericans.org.

State’s strengths

The report found that Kansas has enough scientists and labs to deal with a chemical terrorism threat and test for anthrax or plague. It also has year-round, lab-based influenza surveillance, has two weeks’ hospital bed surge capacity in a moderate pandemic and is one of only 10 states that does not have a nursing shortage, the report found.

“We’re trying to be prepared for any disaster, from tornadoes and ice storms, to mumps and pandemic flu, to any act of terrorism,” said Mindee Reece, director of Kansas’ Center for Public Health Preparedness. “It’s so much more broad than in 2002 when we initiated these activities.”

Kansas maintained its seasonal flu vaccination rate for adults over age 65 and is at or above the national median for the number of adults over 65 who have ever received pneumonia vaccine. The state is compatible with the national surveillance system operated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and it increased or maintained funding for public health services over the past year.

But the state is not fully prepared to distribute vaccines or antidotes in a health disaster, the report found. Only 14 states met that indicator.

Blubaugh said the state was working to improve that. In August, Kansas officials conducted a full-scale exercise to test the ability of state and local governments to detect a bioterrorism attack, and the state’s ability to request, store and ship medicines across Kansas. More exercises are planned in the future.

Recommended actions

Washington has doled out $4 billion since the 2001 terrorist attacks and anthrax deaths to help states better prepare for disasters. But the federal government doesn’t tell the public whether states are well-prepared, Levi said.

Von Roebuck, a spokesman for the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said some information is withheld for security reasons. But he complimented the report, calling it “a valuable tool because it raises awareness for public health emergency efforts to continue.”

The trust recommended that a single federal official from the Department of Health and Human Services oversee all public health programs to better coordinate national preparedness strategy.

It also proposed an emergency health benefit to protect the uninsured and underinsured after a disaster so they would feel free to get treatment, particularly if the emergency involves an infectious disease.

Other recommendations included full funding of all public health emergency programs, a push for new vaccines and the release of all state preparedness data.