Smallpox volunteers sought

By WILL STEWART / Staff Reporter for the Southern Standard

TODD

In the event of a smallpox outbreak, it is questionable if the Warren County Health Department could vaccinate the entire population as officials say they still do not have enough volunteers to man emergency clinics.

“We’ve had a decent response, but we still have a ways to go if we want to get all of the needed emergency-only volunteers in our database by the Jan. 31 deadline,” said Glenda Holland, district director of the health departments of Warren, Van Buren and Cannon counties.

With the increased threat of smallpox being used as biological weapon, the federal government, through state governments and local health offices, has devised plans to vaccinate the entire . population within a 10-day period in the event of an outbreak anywhere in the U.S.

The plan for the Upper Cumberland calls for six vaccination sites to be set up, including one at Warren County High School, where health officials and volunteers would be able to vaccinate the approximately 50,000 people in Warren, Van Buren and Cannon counties over the 10-day period.

To accomplish such a massive undertaking, more than 250 volunteers per day will be needed to staff the local clinic, said health department nurse supervisor Gerane Todd.

Needed are persons with the following skills and/or credentials:

• physicians and nurses

• clerical/secretarial

• data entry/medical records personnel

• pharmacists/pharmacy technicians

• individuals for traffic control and parking

• individuals for crowd control

• translators (for multiple languages including sign language)

• EMTs

• information technology

• mental health professionals

• clergy

• general volunteers to assist with dealing with patients, registration forms, answering phones, etc.

Todd encouraged all who have such skills to volunteer, saying, hopefully, volunteers would never have to be used. In the event they are, she added, last year’s Homeland Security Act releases all volunteers from liability. Additionally, all volunteers and other members of their households will be the first to be offered the vaccination in a post-event response.

Should no smallpox attack occur this year, vaccination of the general population is scheduled to occur on a voluntary basis in 2004, when a more effective vaccine will be available. This third and final phase of the government’s smallpox emergency plan will be preceded by the vaccination of key health officials, including Holland and Todd, next month, and all health care personnel later this year.