From Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health:
Preparedness starts with funding. That’s how everything else gets done—by having resources available to prepare for these kinds of rare but highly impactful events.
Public health departments would use that money to ensure expertise in emergency and pandemic planning. That’s key not only for the public health preparedness, but for preparedness in hospitals and long-term care facilities as well.
The money could also be used for supplies. In the US, we’ve heard a lot of about the Strategic National Stockpile which contains critical medicines and supplies needed during public health disasters. Having the resources to ensure we have extra supplies on hand is crucial.
Preparedness also means having policies and guidance ready to pull off the shelf during crises, rather than starting from scratch. That could include telework policies at an institutional level, or advance thinking on actions like the triggers that would indicate a need to close or reopen schools.
Caitlin M. Rivers, PhD, MPH is a senior scholar with the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and an assistant professor in the Environmental Health and Engineering department of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.