This tabletop exercise offers public health personnel and their local emergency response counterparts an opportunity to gain knowledge and skills in preparing for and responding to a bioterrorist event or a large-scale communicable disease outbreak. The exercise will enable participants to identify the communications, resources, data, coordination and organizational elements associated with an emergency response. The exercise focuses on identifying the policy issues that need to be considered in responding to a bioterrorist event. Although the primary goal of this exercise is to identify agency-wide and inter-agency issues, it also offers participants an opportunity to assess their own preparedness for responding to the scenario and identify individual needs for information or training.
Intended audience:
Anyone who would be responding to a public health emergency, including hospital administrators and clinicians; public health administrators, nurses, laboratory directors, and environmental health staff; school district administrators; and first responders—emergency medical services, fire safety, law enforcement, and emergency medical technicians.
Content:
Facilitator's Manual
Detailed manual for the exercise facilitator, including explanation of the goals of the exercise, the roles of exercise participants and a suggested narrative to accompany the slide presentation (34 pages).
Exercise Presentation Slides
Slide presentation of the incident (46 slides).
Handouts
Handouts for distribution to participants during the exercise (11 pages).
Tips for Teaching with Tabletop Exercises
Tip sheet that provides guidance on how to conduct tabletop exercises (1 page).
"Training for Public Health Emergencies"
An article by Carl Osaki about this exercise, published in Northwest Public Health in 2001 (3 pages).