Emergency Preparedness and Response

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), Personal Protective Technology (PPT) Program and National Personal Protective Technology Laboratory (NPPTL) will hold a stakeholder meeting on March 29, 2011, at the Hyatt Regency Pittsburgh Airport.

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) has categorized workplace violence into four types: 1) violence associated with criminal intent, 2) customer/client violence, 3) employee-on-employee violence, and 4) violence associated with personal relationships. The last category includes sexual violence and spillover of domestic violence into the workplace.
 

A September 21, 2010 National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) news release provides an update on the Models of Infectious Disease Agent Study (MIDAS), an on-going effort by a group of researchers to model how H1N1 and other infectious agents may spread. This update comes as public health officials in the US prepare for the upcoming flu season.

The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) is soliciting comments on the development of the 2012 Emergency Response Guidebook (ERG2012), particularly from those who have experience using the 2008 Emergency Response Guidebook (ERG).

The ERG is for use by emergency services personnel to provide guidance for initial response to hazardous materials incidents. The ERG2012 will supersede the ERG2008. The development of the ERG2012 is a joint effort involving the transportation agencies of the United States, Canada, and Mexico.

In April 2009, businesses, schools, governments, health organizations, and individuals across the globe were focused on the potentially devastating spread of the Influenza A H1N1 virus. While the virus has proven to be, at least at the time of this writing, less severe than originally thought just a few weeks earlier ORC believes there is value in examining and learning from the collective company responses during one of the more critical weeks of the virus’s evolution.

During the past two years, ORC has been working with county health departments in California to encourage business participation in the CDC Cities Readiness Initiative (CRI). This is a federally funded program to prepare major U.S cities to effectively respond to a large scale public health emergency within a short time frame. There has been increased interest generated in this program due to the recent swine flu outbreak.