Limestone County Coroner Mike West said at a recent Alabama Public Health Department training session on pandemic preparedness that the community does not have adequate facilities to process a large influx of fatalities.
APHD has held monthly training sessions in the North Alabama area for emergency responders to educate them on the procedures to take in case local services are compromised by mass absenteeism as the result of an outbreak of the dreaded bird flu, which has thus far been confined to Southeast Asia.
“Homeland Security grants have gone regional,” said West. “Cullman County has a 400-slot refrigerated morgue with mobile autopsy lab. If it’s a pandemic flu, where will we go? We will be inundated with bodies. Do you think Cullman will be able to bring up their mobile morgue?
“Homeland Security is going to have to think on a county level. Cullman is ideal for a tornado if we need to go to them. One trailer to accommodate 18 bodies is $43,000. Locals can’t fund those so we have to turn to the federal government, but there are not that many grants out there for mortuary services.”
The last major pandemic flu outbreak in 1918 in which some 50 million people worldwide died is the benchmark by which researchers measure the catastrophic effects of a global outbreak. Scientists are rushing to ensure adequate supplies of vaccine.
Hospital officials say that while bird flu is not getting the national and international media coverage it once did, they are still in contact with health officials around the world.
Every time there is a diagnosed case of bird flu they said they get an e-mail.
The Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta has also advised officials that as many children as possible should be vaccinated against bird flu, according to Ronnie Gibbs, school nurse for the Limestone County school system.
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Coroner: No local facilities to handle influx of fatalities
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