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Recently the TFAH or Trust for America's Health, an advocacy group, brought out its seventh annual report on the public health preparedness. According to the TFAH report on public health preparedness of nation, the US preparedness in response to the H1N1 influenza pandemic is worth of praising, though at the same time revealed and highlighted some serious lacuna in the ability to deal with emergencies with regards to the public health.
The published TFAH report on public health preparedness of the nation is a report consisting of both bad and good news on public health system. This nonprofit group remarked that while owing to the investments made in the public health preparedness in the recent years, there has been a dramatic improvement in the readiness for the epidemic, there are still a lot places to be concentrated on. According to them, the pandemic has also highlighted the deficiency in various systemic requirements such as proper disease surveillance, capability in vaccine production as well as laboratory testing, workforce devoted in public health. While the decade-long inadequate funding is being attributed for this lacking in preparedness, the reports TFAH report on public health preparedness of the nation also blames the recent economic downturn as its one of the many causes.
Owing to the recent economic meltdown, the preparedness fund granted to the states has also been curtailed. According to this TFAH report on public health preparedness of the nation, since 2005, there has been a shrinkage of 27% in federal grant. In spite of this, the response made by the public health personnel to the pandemic is quite praiseworthy. According to the Deputy Director of TFAH, Mr. Richard Hamburg, considering all the negative aspects, overall the response is quite impressive.
This TFAH report on public health preparedness of the nation praised the American Government for being transparent about the pandemic to its people. According to Dr. Irwin Redlener, director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health, while in spite there was some problem with the pace at which vaccines were being produced, but when produced, due to the hardworking of the public health personnel, they were able to be distributed quite rapidly.
In spite of all praises, this report also blames the lack of information with regards to the emergency health preparedness. As the report says, the main objective of the report is to promote greater accountability with which the taxpayers' money is used to ensure and improve nation's preparedness against all the health emergencies. At the same time Dr. Redlener admitted the absence of generally accepted definition of the preparedness against a pandemic. Though the exact amount spent since September 11, 2001 aiming at the preparedness is also unknown, he added, many of the efforts are not coherent and not helpful to this purpose.
Indicators for The Public Health Preparedness
TFAH report on public health preparedness of the nation has set 10 indicators for the purpose of getting a true picture of preparedness: These are:
- Stockpiling of antiviral medications.
- Preparedness from the part of the hospital.
- Pick up as well as delivery service of the public health laboratories.
- Surge workforce of the public health laboratories.
- Food safety.
- Biosurveillance.
- MRC or Medical Reserve Corps readiness.
- Preparedness for the legal aspect.
- Community resiliency.
- Commitment with regard to the public health funding.
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