Bush and Public Health Emergency Preparedness

Bush and Public Health Emergency Preparedness:TPM

I'm an epidemiologist with Los Angeles County Public Health Department, and I worked there all through the Bush years, and have worked closely with CDC throughout my career.

I just want to inform your reporting on the trend of public health spending during those years. Bush sent a LOT of money to public health departments. A LOT. There was the push to vaccinate every person against smallpox (remember that?) and there were other foolish vaccination-type initiatives as well.

But most of the money they threw at us was bioterrorism money. And I do mean they threw it at us. We had so much bioterrorism money (BT) that most large health departments (which are largely local animals -- city-run or county-run) formed whole sections in their departments, fully staffed and rolling in money such that the staff couldn't even spend fast enough.

And this for a problem that didn't exist, of course. There was no bioterrorism. But we did use the money wisely, on emergency planning and resourcing. Every public health worker was trained in emergency management. Our public health lab was expanded and highly improved. And of course as you know, California has earthquakes, so we broadened the emergency management training protocols to include natural disasters, which are infinitely more likely than a massive bioterrorism attack, I'm sure every sane person would agree.

That massive public health response to the Bird Flu in 2009? That was due to the expansive program of emergency management across the US almost entirely funded by bioterrorism money. So ultimately the money didn't go to waste.

Unfortunately, much of the money for more routine public health measures was either cut or turned over to ideologues. I could enumerate the insanity, but it's not relevant here. I do give Bush credit, however, for saving millions of lives in Africa with his malaria and HIV initiatives there.

Of course, the severe recession and the sequester and all the rest put severe strain on local health departments these past years, as we all know. We are just now starting to recover the lost staff and the lost capability. I am, however, completely confident that our local health system is fully prepared in the event of an outbreak. Our ACD and public health nurses and investigators are first rate.

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