Emergency Planning is normally a term used in the context of local authority civil protection and is a statutory duty alongside business continuity planning for those organizations.  The term also corresponds with the statutory duties of first responders such as police, fire & rescue, coastguard and ambulance services.

In UK we appear to be over the first wave of pandemic flu (H1N1 or “Swine Flu”) so it’s time to look at lessons identified from phase one and to prepare for phase 2 which could begin anytime soon given the global nature of this emergency.

A key problem for nations is how to administer the H1N1 vaccine once it becomes available and in UK primary care trusts and strategic health organizations are working with the national health service and a variety of other stakeholders including General Practitioners to figure out how to get this done.

One element of the problem is the lack of capacity to deliver an inoculation programme in addition to existing services – as you can imagine, no business has boxes full of spare resource on tap to cope with a surge in demand.  At this time of year GPs are gearing up to deliver other vaccinations (not least the seasonal flu jab) and after Christmas are pretty maxed out doing the paperwork to support their various performance led payments which has to be submitted to the PCTs before the end of this financial year.

Another emergency planning issue is the sheer logistics of getting large numbers of people with work and family commitments, underlying health conditions, no transport, communication difficulties or other lifestyle factors that make them hard to reach through the doors of whichever venue you are able to use to receive the particular inoculation – with the accompanying paperwork, counselling and aftercare.  I’d estimate that each jab will take a minimum of 10 minutes so to get through any sensible number of people you will need to have a form of production line or inoculation centre which won’t feel as people friendly as one might prefer – particularly for those that are nervous about the process or difficult to communicate with.

With the first wave behind us we must also face the fact that there is likely to be a degree of complacency about coming forward for the jab and a mismatch between those you’d like to have it and those that are clamouring for it who don’t qualify medically for it – often referred to as the worried well.

To a degree this is uncharted territory so that provides an opportunity to leverage technology that didn’t previously exist as a means of filling the “funnel” with clients and filtering them into appointment slots that are mutually agreeable.  In terms of delivering the injections themselves we may be constrained by availability of the vaccine – and that could make it easier to match our limited capacity and provide a “reasonable” argument for not vaccinating everyone that presents for their injection; otherwise I feel it will be all hands to the pumps – drawing on voluntary organisations such as the Red Cross and St John’s Ambulance as well as qualified first aiders that can be cross-trained to deliver injections under a one to many supervision arrangements: perhaps in the workplace or nursing home?

In the coming months I will be directly involved in trying to solve this emergency planning problem with clients so I will let you know how things are working out and what seems to work as we plan, trial and adjust.

Watch this space.