Posted on: Thursday, July 15, 2004
Antidote packs due in Hawai'i in a year
Advertiser Staff and News Services
Hawai'i health officials expect to get additional stocks of antidotes against chemical weapons in about a year as part of a federal program to boost preparedness for terrorist attacks.
Bart Aronoff, manager of the state's bioterrorism preparedness program, confirmed that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has begun sending supplies of "chem-packs" to all states.
The long-awaited federal shipments of antidotes against chemical weapons are being sent under a program that aims to have stocks in every state within two years.
The CDC began quietly shipping the chem-packs four months ago. New York City and Boston, sites of the upcoming national political conventions, were among the early recipients.
The program provides "a quick way for hospitals to know they'll have the antidotes they need," Donna Knutson, CDC's deputy director of terrorism preparedness, told The Associated Press Tuesday.
It was prompted in part because there has been "an uneven level of protection across the country," added Steve Adams, deputy director of the Strategic National Stockpile Program.
Much of the nation's ongoing efforts to prepare for terrorism have focused on biological attacks. For example, the National Pharmaceutical Stockpile contains tons of drugs, vaccines and other medical supplies in storage around the country, so that any U.S. city can receive a shipment within 12 hours.
That may be enough time to react to an incubating infection like anthrax, but the ability to survive a chemical attack depends on immediate decontamination and rapid administration of appropriate antidotes.
Yet those antidotes are expensive and have fairly short shelf-lives, making them hard for many states to keep stocked.
In Hawai'i, Aronoff said the antidotes are available in ambulances and emergency rooms throughout the state, but the federal program will save the state money by providing the drugs for free.
Aronoff said the additional supplies would have the capacity to treat up to 1,000 patients per chem-pack. "With bioterrorism or an industrial accident, time is of the essence," he said.
The packs come with a variety of chemical antidotes, such as atropine to fight nerve agents. Some are in autoinjectors for attack-site use; others are packaged for emergency-room use.
The CDC invested $56 million last year in creating the chem-packs, and has budgeted about $34 million this year as the distribution begins, officials said.
Dr. Georges Benjamin of the American Public Health Association, said the chem-packs will ensure "you have a ready cache of supplies if you have a large number of chemical victims."
Advertiser staff writer Robbie Dingeman and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
