Frequent drills ensures risk management preparedness.

By Ma Kang-yao
Taiwan News,Supplement Reporter
Photos Courtesy of DOH

Since September 11, 2001, the character of the public health changed. "Just like the fire and police departments, Public Health is pushed to be at the front line in the fight against the threat of bio-terrorism," said Dr. Devlin. "Public health workers became the first responders to protect people's lives and properties. How to strike a balance between the traditional works with its new task after 911 is a new challenge for us. The solution is to focus on public health priorities."

"It is not the natural disaster and they are specifically designed and carried out to cause harm to our people." said Dr. Steve Cline, who is the North Carolina State Chief Epidemiologist and Public Health Preparedness & Response Director with 20 years experience in the state and local public health area, "a new normal of public health is formed. Now, preparedness is the core public health function. It becomes the central role of states to work with local communities to be able to respond the public health threats." Dr Cline stressed that State has a role of coordination, communication and cooperation with all partners. Further more, during the Anthrax firedrill in October 2001, the government of North Carolina recognized that every emergency starts from the local level. "Our local partners are the first to discover, report and respond appropriately," said Dr. Cline.

In Texas, DSHS applies all- hazards approaches in natural disasters, bioterrorism and pandemic influenza. "911 set the stage for strengthening the preparedness infrastructure in all levels," said Dr. Sanchez "the fear of bioterrorism event following 911 made more resources available to public health system. The resource strengthens not only the defense to bioterrorism but also to other aspects such as communication, partnership (relationship building), planning (collaborative planning), infrastructure, (system building) exercises (coordination) and execution and review."

Reassuring Stakeholders

The success of risk management lies much on communication and communication is the way to bring people in the public health network. Minister Hou uses a term "Preventive Inoculation" as an analogy to risk communication. That is to communicate with the stakeholders in advance and stick to majority's interest. Dr. Cline explained that from the threat of Anthrax, they learned that they are dealing with a perception issue, even when not having the diseases "It is not like the World Trade Center. You can see and know what happened and in response to rebuild and take care of the people. It is invisible and all people are vulnerable," said Dr. Cline.

For risk communication, Dr. Swinson said that the mission of communication is to make a speedy and efficient resolution, meets the needs of the stakeholders and build public trust. Dr. Swinson is Vice President of Government and Community Affairs and External Relations at Duke University Medical Center and Health System. Over the past 30 years, her career has spanned government, policy and academe.

"Risk communication needs to be transparent and responsive, understand wants and needs of stakeholders, communicate a fair outcome without favoring any interests and provide a cost effective solution," she said. "To accomplish the objectives, we have to set the priorities of actions," she said, "audiences are important. First we have to identify who they are. These audiences can turn into be our resources and they can be divided into internal and external. The internal resources are those who are available to deal with the situation. We need to contact them and let them know when we need them. They are our partnership. They may be staff, crisis team, communicators or business partners like educational organizations and non- profit organizations." The external resources are the journalist, news media, affected communities, special interest groups, and professional associations. These groups are as influential to damage the relationships between government and the public or help vice versa. Dr. Devlin stressed a strong leadership in risk communication. "First of all we need to have a trustful leader to speak in one voice about what we need to do. Second, we need to have timely, accurate and complete information," she continued "and share this information with the public. It is the way to stop the rumor from spiraling and building up our credibility." Mr. Carson said that the consumers' first concern is what can I do in my home to make food safe. "We must have a clear, concise voice to the target audience. Meanwhile, we have to maintain the scientific and legal foundation with plain language and regularly check the message," said Mr. Carson, "The public is saturated with news and information. So we just need to deliver enough information, be deliberative, get it right first and be resolute," he said, "public knowledge about food safety has increased over past 10 years. Public concerns about food safety risks have increased as well. Consumers can be the asset in fighting foodborne illness. We must educate and use them."

Dr. Swinson's remarks can be a great a conclusion to the two-days symposium. "The lessons we learned here is that crisis creates opportunities to achieve other strategic or tactical goals. Crisis may present opportunities for creative solutions with greater flexibility."