Health Flu vaccination rates lower than expected Don’t rely on drugs to delay flu pandemic Bird flu may be spread indirectly, WHO   says Emergency Services GTVC: Mapping tool allows emergency management personnel to visually track    resources FDNY unveils high-rise fire simulator Security Cell phone sensors detect radiation to thwart nuclear terrorism Government serious about chemical security Educators fear that school buses could be targets Federal Agency Events Government touts ‘border cards’ as passport alternative National response framework released International News Terror threat from Europe could lead to strict controls on traveling to America U.S. intel alerted to threat of ‘Forest Fire Jihad’ India risks bird flu ‘disaster’, human cases feared Academic Studies/Meetings Team IDs weakness in anthrax bacteria Active influenza surveillance at the local level: A model for local health agencies

Health

Flu vaccination rates among children and high-risk adults in the U.S. are much lower than expected. That means that millions of people would be unprotected if there is a major flu outbreak, says a report released by the University of Michigan C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital National Poll on Children’s Health. The latest online survey of 2,131 adults was conducted in December. It found that among households with children ages 5 and younger, there was only a 36 percent vaccination rate. Another 18 percent of households said they still planned to vaccinate their children this season. The poll also found that flu vaccination rates among high-risk adults -- those ages 50 and older and those with chronic diseases -- were well below national target levels.

Don’t rely on drugs to delay flu pandemic
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080123/us_nm/birdflu_prevention_dc;_ylt=Ai2PBVLdiVcMw....

Vaccines and drugs will not be enough to slow or prevent a pandemic of influenza, according to a U.S. government report. The report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) confirms what most experts have been stressing for years -- that the pharmaceutical industry cannot be relied on alone to protect the world from bird flu. Health experts almost universally agree that a global epidemic -- a pandemic -- of influenza is inevitable and even overdue. Quick use of antiviral drugs can save lives. A vaccine would also help, the GAO report noted. But supplies of both are low and a vaccine would have to be formulated to match the precise strain causing a pandemic -- a process that currently takes months. Many countries have no way to even keep track of outbreaks, meaning the virus could spread unnoticed.

Bird flu may be spread indirectly, WHO says
http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSN1616209020080117?sp=true

The H5N1 bird flu virus may sometimes stick to surfaces or get kicked up in fertilizer dust to infect people, according to a World Health Organization report. The WHO team reviewed all known human cases of avian influenza, which has infected 350 people in 14 countries and killed 217 of them since 2003, and found that 25 percent of cases have no explanation. Most are passed directly from bird to people, they noted in their report, published in the New England Journal of Medicine. Very rarely one person can infect another -- always close relatives via intimate physical contact. It could be that small particles of virus-contaminated fluid stuck to surfaces, they said, or fertilizer made from infected bird feces somehow carried the virus into people’s noses or mouths.

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Emergency Services

GTVC: Mapping tool allows emergency management personnel to visually track resources
http://gtresearchnews.gatech.edu/newsrelease/gtvc-mapping.htm

According to a statement released today by the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI), a collaborative mapping tool developed by GTRI is helping emergency management officials better coordinate event and incident planning – and real-time response. GTRI has teamed with Atlanta-based Emergency Visions to provide mapping capabilities for a resource database the firm developed to identify, activate, track, and coordinate response assets. GTVC can track chemical or smoke plumes and help management personnel plan evacuation routes for emergencies such as hurricanes, fires, or flooding. To do this, the system tracks resources including the locations of hospitals, fire stations, schools, nursing homes, sand bags, dump trucks, water, personnel, and supplies in an affected region. The map can also indicate the status of those assets, such as the number of beds available in a specific hospital.

FDNY unveils high-rise fire simulator
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080123/ap_on_re_us/fdny_simulator;_ylt=AoZkg1pQJWtdZ....

Officials broke ground on a simulator that will help firefighter trainees prepare to face a high-rise fire. The four-story, 4,000-square-foot space will be constructed atop an existing building and will include a dry standpipe system, mock elevators and stairways, and a mock fire command station. It will include layouts of residential, office, and commercial space. The training area will be able to simulate a fire and “flashover,” the moment when everything combustible in a space goes up in flames. There will be video hookups on each floor for teaching purposes. It is scheduled to be completed next year. At the groundbreaking ceremony, New York City’s mayor said the $4.5 million simulator “will help train our members for one of the most notoriously complex parts of the job.”

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Security

Cell phone sensors detect radiation to thwart nuclear terrorism
http://news.uns.purdue.edu/x/2008a/080122FischbachNuclear.html

Researchers at Purdue University are working with the state of Indiana to develop a system that would use a network of cell phones to detect and track radiation to help prevent terrorist attacks with radiological “dirty bombs” and nuclear weapons. Such a system could blanket the nation with millions of cell phones equipped with radiation sensors able to detect even light residues of radioactive material. Because cell phones already contain global positioning locators, the network of phones would serve as a tracking system, said a physics professor. Tiny solid-state radiation sensors are commercially available. The detection system would require additional circuitry and would not add significant bulk to portable electronic products. The technology is unlike any other system, particularly because the software can work with a variety of sensor types.

Government serious about chemical security
http://www.carrollcountytimes.com/articles/2008/01/22/features/business/biz973.txt

The Department of Homeland Security recently announced a delay that exempts farmers and other agricultural facilities from having to complete a vulnerability screening, and the agency is working to make the screening more appropriate for farmers. The screening will help DHS determine if it needs to follow up with individuals to do further vulnerability assessments. It is important to note agriculture fertilizer dealers and pesticide dealers are not exempt. This extension applies to crop, fruit, nut, and vegetable farms; ranches and rangeland; poultry, dairy, and equine facilities; turfgrass growers; golf courses; nurseries; floriculture operations; and public and private parks.

Educators fear that school buses could be targets
http://blog.syracuse.com/news/2008/01/educators_fear_that_school_bus.html

In North Carolina, school bus drivers are being trained to spot suspicious activity and, in some districts, drivers peek under their buses every morning in search of anything odd. The president of a national group of school transportation directors and the transportation chief for the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction other school transportation leaders fear that the federal government is not taking their concerns about terrorism seriously. “The nation’s school bus system is the largest system of public transportation. It’s just very vulnerable. We’ve been concerned about that for quite some time.” The federal Transportation Security Administration has yet to begin a safety assessment that Congress ordered in August. Though the agency has poured billions of dollars into shoring up security for ports, railways, motor coaches, and the air industry in the past six years, it has done little for the millions of children who ride school buses, school leaders said. In August, legislation signed by President Bush gave the TSA a year to develop a national assessment of school bus security. The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee and a committee member learned last week that the TSA has yet to develop a plan for how to go about the assessment. A spokesman for the TSA said the study would be completed on time.

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Federal Agency Events

While U.S. citizens will be required to show proof of identification and citizenship at land and sea borders beginning January 31, the truly big changes will occur in June of 2009 when citizens returning to the United States via land and sea will be required to carry passports, just as they are required to when arriving via air today. But there is an alternative. The Department of Homeland Security has approved a number of alternatives for frequent border crossers. First, DHS is working with numerous border states to develop “enhanced drivers’ licenses” that would meet government security requirements and be accepted at border crossings. The State Department is also developing a passport card -- a wallet-sized card that would be cheaper and more convenient than a passport, but would fulfill the same function at land borders. Passport cards and enhanced drivers’ licenses both will have “vicinity radio frequency identification,” or RFID chips, which will identify the holders as they approach border checkpoints. The CBP official said the chips will not transmit sensitive information, rather they will contain a unique number that the CBP can use to automatically call up information on the travelers and query law enforcement databases.

National response framework released
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-animals14jan14,0,5243172.story

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) today announced that it had “released the National Response Framework (NRF), successor to the National Response Plan. The NRF, which focuses on response and short-term recovery, articulates the doctrine, principles, and architecture by which our nation prepares for and responds to all-hazard disasters across all levels of government and all sectors of communities. The NRF is responsive to repeated federal, state, local, and private sector requests for a streamlined document that is less bureaucratic and more user-friendly. The NRF also focuses on preparedness and encourages a higher level of readiness across all jurisdictions. The NRF is being released following an extensive process of outreach and coordination between DHS and key stakeholders representing federal, tribal, state, and local governments, non-governmental agencies and associations, and the private sector.” “The National Response Framework is an essential tool for emergency managers at all levels,” said the DHS secretary. “It helps define the roles, responsibilities, and relationships critical to effective emergency planning, preparedness and response to any emergency or disaster. Today’s release reflects the culmination of many months of hard work and collaboration within the nation’s emergency management community.”

To access the NRF: www.fema.gov/nrf

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International News

Terror threat from Europe could lead to strict controls on traveling to America
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=508535&in_page_id=1770

The growing threat of terrorists from Europe has led America to consider forcing Britons and other visitors to go through tougher checks when they enter the country, according to the U.S.’s head of homeland security. He said that Europe was increasingly seen as a platform for a potential terror attack in America. He explained that he had no plans to scrap the visa waiver program, but could force Britons and others to register online before traveling. The BBC also reported that a posting to a known Islamic extremist website talked about founding a branch of Al Qaida in the U.K. and killing British politicians, including the prime minister.

U.S. intel alerted to threat of ‘Forest Fire Jihad’
http://www.worldtribune.com/worldtribune/WTARC/2008/me_terror_01_15.asp

U.S. officials monitoring terrorist web sites have discovered a call for using forest fires as weapons against “crusader” nations. A terrorist website carried a posting that called for “Forest Jihad.” The statement, in Arabic, said that “summer has begun so do not forget the Forest Jihad.” The writer called on all Muslims in the United States, Europe, Russia, and Australia to “start forest fires.” On damage caused by wildfires, the report said that the fires typically take months to put out which means that “this terror will haunt them for an extended period of time.” The fires also will cause economic damage because it will limit exports of timber used to make furniture and also will cause losses to pharmaceutical companies that use trees for ingredients for drugs, the posting said. Smoke caused by the fires will create pollution and military forces could be tied up fighting fires. The post noted that U.S. military forces in Iraq or Afghanistan “could even be recalled” as occurred following hurricane Katrina, which did not occur. “Imagine if, after all the losses caused by such an event, a jihadist organization were to claim responsibility for (starting) the forest fires,” the writer said. “You can hardly begin to imagine the level of the fear that would take hold of people in the United States, in Europe, in Russia, and in Australia.” The post urges terrorists to use sulphuric acid to start a forest fire, as well as gasoline.

India risks bird flu ‘disaster’, human cases feared
http://asia.news.yahoo.com/080122/afp/080122092518int.html

India’s worst ever outbreak of bird flu could turn into a disaster, an official warned, as five people were reportedly quarantined with symptoms of the virus. Eight districts in the eastern state of West Bengal have been hit by the virus, and dead birds are being sold and locals said to be “feasting” on cheap chicken. The state’s animal resources minister said authorities were “determined to cull all poultry in the districts in three or four days, otherwise the state will face a disaster.” More than 100,000 bird deaths have been reported, and teams are racing to cull two million chickens and ducks. The Times of India reported five people in West Bengal have been quarantined with “clinical symptoms” of avian flu -- including fever, coughing, sore throat, and muscle ache -- after handling affected poultry. If the tests are positive, this will be the first case of human infection in India, home to 1.1 billion people and hit by bird flu among poultry three times since 2006.

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Academic Studies/Meetings

Massachusetts Institute of Technology and New York University researchers have identified a weakness in the defenses of the anthrax bacterium that could be exploited to produce new antibiotics. The researchers found that nitric oxide (NO) is a critical part of Bacillus anthracis’ defense against the immune response launched by cells infected with the bacterium. Anthrax bacteria that cannot produce NO succumb to the immune system’s attack. The Arthur Amos Noyes Professor of Chemistry at MIT and an author of a paper on the work said antibiotics developed to capitalize on this vulnerability could be effective against other bacteria that employ the same defense system. Those bacteria include Staphylococcus aureus, which commonly causes infections in hospitals and can be extremely drug-resistant. The paper appeared in the January 21 online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Active Influenza Surveillance at the Local Level: A Model for Local Health Agencies

Citation: Tista S. Ghosh and Richard L. Vogt. Am J Public Health (98): 213-215, 2008. http://www.ajph.org/cgi/content/abstract/98/2/213

Laboratory-supported, community-based local surveillance systems for influenza can act as early warning systems in identifying the initial entry points of different influenza strains into the community. Unfortunately, local health departments often have limited resources to implement this type of surveillance. The authors developed and evaluated an active, local influenza surveillance system in 3 metropolitan Denver, Colorado, counties that enabled timely case ascertainment and strain identification at little cost. When compared with Colorado’s surveillance system, the system detected cases 7 to 8 weeks earlier than the state’s electronic disease reporting system.

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