The Weekly Journal

EU Identification and Response to a Pandemic

Having a solid identification and response plan for a pandemic is essential. This
document first outlines measures that should be taken in identifying and screening for
possible occurrences of a pandemic. Secondly, a response plan is outlined detailing
mechanisms vital to containing and stopping the spread of a pandemic.

Identification and Screening:
Before a response plan can be implemented, information regarding the disease must be
collected.

One important step in fighting a pandemic is to identify the etiological agent of the
disease. Knowing the etiological agent can greatly help in treating and containing the
disease. In order to identify the pathogen responsible, a laboratory and team of
scientists must be devoted toward this process and a system of collecting and sending
samples to this lab must be created.

The epidemiology of the disease is also vital if the disease is to be contained. There
are many important aspects about the disease that must be determined like what region the
disease originated. Also, it is important to determine if there are any vectors of the
disease. If there are vectors, such as an animal, it is important to know if the disease
is spread only from vector to animal or if the disease is also spread from human to
human. Thus, there must be a group of epidemiologist working in conjunction with the lab
scientists to study the disease.

Information regarding the disease itself is also vital to the identification process.
Scientists must gain as much information as they can on the disease virulence factors,
incubation period of the disease, how infectious the disease is, its mortality rate, how
the disease infects humans, and most importantly, the signs and symptoms of the disease.
Using all this information scientists should create a clinical definition of the disease
which states important sings and symptoms that can identify infected individuals.
Moreover, a confirmatory lab test to correctly identify infected persons is vital. To do
this, again, a dedicated lab and team of scientists are needed.

After this preliminary data is accumulated a screening and alert system must be
implemented. A team of health workers must be trained to be able to recognize signs and
symptoms of the disease. Moreover, they must be located in hospitals and entry points of
the EU so that infected individuals can be immediately processed. To help the
epidemiologists track the spread of the disease, an information system must be created to
facilitate the spread of information about the disease. This could be a website where
information could be accessed. Finally, a lab test must be developed that can identify
positive individuals in a timely matter.

The Response Plan:

The disease screening process is just the first step in preventing the spread of a
pandemic and responding to the pandemic is equally important. The 2003 SARS (sever acute
respiratory syndrome) pandemic provided a great learning experience for officials in
fighting a pandemic. The CDC stated that the most important thing to successfully
containing a pandemic was to have an organized response plan. This included clearly
outlining the roles of everyone involved in the response and the people in charge of the
various response teams. Moreover, they stated that strong leadership was essential when
distributing resources and information; having adequate resources was also important.
Finally, having a political plan that allowed quick legislation regarding the pandemic to
be passed was essential.

For the response plan, there must be an organization that oversees the plan such as the
WHO. Leaders that oversee the entire response must be named. Moreover, the
epidemiologists and scientists all need to have clearly defined roles. There must also be
a branch such as the military, each with defined roles, that is in place to control the
public if needed. There must also be a branch created to help collect and make
information about the pandemic readily available. Finally, political heads need to be
named that could quickly form and pass pandemic related legislation. Moreover, funding
and resources must be set aside so that they can be immediately used. Overall, a plan
must be made that dictates what these branches do and how the resources available are
used.

The plan should first stop the spread of the disease and then attempt to prevent the
disease. This plan could be as simple as quarantining infected individuals and closely
monitoring people they were in close contact with. Once information was accumulated about
the disease, measures could be taken such as limiting contact with vectors. Also,
immigrating people from affected areas should be closely screened. As a last resort
immigration from affected areas could be stopped altogether. Once the spread was
controlled, disease prevention could be initiated through attempting to create a vaccine
against the disease or finding medicine that fights the etiological agent.

Sources:

http://www.who.int/csr/resources/publications/WHO_CDS_CSR_ARO_2004_1.pdf



http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/sars/guidance/B/pdf/summary.pdf

http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/sars/guidance/A/pdf/a.pdf